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THE 



FAMILY OF BETHANY: 



OR, 



MEDITATIONS 



ON THE ELEVENTH CHAPTER OF THE GOSPEL 
ACCORDING TO ST. JOHN 



BY L. BONNET, 
it 

LATB ONE OP THE CHAPLAINS OF THE FRENCH CHURCH IN LONDON. 
TRANSLATED FROM THE FRENCH. 

WITH AN 

INTRODUCTORY ESSAY, 
BY THE REV. HUGH WHITE, 

AUTHOR OF "MEDITATIONS ON PRAYER," " THE SECOND 
ADVENT," &C 

FOURTH AMERICAN, PROM THE EIGHTH LONDON EDITION. 

NEW YORK: 

ROBERT CARTER & BROTHERS, 
No. 5 30 BROADWAY. 

1859. 









In Exchange 

Univ, of Wisconsim, 
BAY 2 6 193? 



ft 

'<f CONTENTS 



AGE 

Introductory Essay .5 



MEDITATION I. 
Lazarus, Mary, and Martha ... .53 

MEDITATION II. 

Lazarus sick.— The Glory of God . . 69 

MEDITATION III, 

The Love of Jesus, and the Trial of Faith . . 8b 

MEDITATION IV 
The Heroism of Jesus. — The Twelve Hours of the Day . 103 

MEDITATION V, 
Our Friend Lazarus sleepeth • . 124 



IV CONTENTS. 

MEDITATION VI. 

PAGE 

The Fear of Death.— Distaste for Life . . . .139 

MEDITATION VII. 

The Four Days of Trial.— The First Consolations 156 

MEDITATION VIII. 
Jesus Christ is the Resurrection and the Li:*e . , 175 

MEDITATION IX. 
Jesus wept . . 193 

MEDITATION X. 
Lazarus, Come forth .216 

MEDITATION XI 
Conclusion ..»•*«.. . 237 



INTRODUCTORY ESSAY 



The more attentively we examine the constitu- 
tion of the Gospel-scheme of salvation, the more 
fully will we he convinced, that it is the ultimate 
design of that scheme, to re-enthrone in the heart 
of man that principle, which reigned there before 
the fall in full supremacy, and in which his highest 
glory and happiness consisted — the love of God. 

As long as this principle maintained its rightful 
sovereignty over man's heart, subordinating to its 
sanctifying sway all the inferior affections and 
appetites of man's nature, and rendering his whole 
life one continued thank-offering to the God of all 
his blessings ; man stood forth, in all his primeval 
dignity and blessedness, only " a little lower than 
the angels," the vicegerent and representative of 
the majesty of the Most High on earth ! The 
image of the Deity was reflected, with beautiful 
distinctness, in the unsullited mirror of his sinless 
soul, and the paradise around him was but an 
emblem — fair, indeed, yet faint — of the far love 
Aex paradise within ! 

1* 



6 INTRODUCTORY ESSAY. 

But no sooner had that fatal act of disobedience 
to the Divine command, " which brought sin into 
the world, and all our woe," dethroned the love 
of God from the heart of man, — than in one mo- 
ment all his glory departed from him — all his 
happiness passed away as a dream; the image 
of God was effaced from his soul, and that of 
Satan stamped in its stead ; and the earth, cursed 
for his sake, sending forth thorns and thistles 
from its blighted soil, became but too appro- 
priate an emblem of the far drearier desert of 
man's soul, where, under the blighting curse of 
an angry God, all the sweet flowers of celestial 
growth, which bloomed so brightly in the morning 
of man's innocence, withered away, and there 
suddenly sprung up the thorns and thistles of 
anguish, remorse, and despair. 

This being the case, it is manifest that, if the 
Gospel-scheme be designed to restore man to the 
happiness from which, by sin, he has fallen, it 
must be its design, for the accomplishment of this 
object, to restore to its rightful ascendancy over 
man's affections that principle, in which the very 
essence of man's primeval happiness was concen- 
trated. And is not this palpably the professed 
design of the Gospel-scheme ? Is not the great 
object which it has in view emphatically this — 
that the love of God may be shed abroad in the 
heart of man by the Holy Ghost ? And does it 
not employ, for this purpose, means most glori- 
ously adapted for its accomplishment ; even such 
a stupendous revelation of God's love to man, as., 



INTRODUCTORY ESSAY. ? 

when cordially believed through the influence of 
the Holy Spirit, must overpower the sullen enmity 
and melt down the icy coldness of man's heart 
towards God, into the softened tenderness of peni- 
tential sorrow — the warm glow of grateful love % 

What a beautiful compendium of the Gospel- 
scheme has the beloved disciple comprised in the 
compass of a single verse : " Herein is love ! not 
that we loved God, but that He loved us, and 
sent His son to be the propitiation for our sins." 
There is something amazingly impressive in these 
words ; they unfold to our view unutterable things 
of the love of God ; they seem to tell us, that all 
God's love is concentrated in this manifestation ; 
that here all its scattered rays converge into a 
focus of such surpassing brightness, as altogether 
eclipses every other exhibition of the love of God. 
Herein is love ! It is as if St. John had said — 
Doubt as you may the love of God, when you look 
elsewhere for proofs, yet here, at least, you must 
feel that you cannot, dare not, indulge a doubt, 
for you cannot look to the cross, and not be com- 
pelled to confess — Herein is love ! Nor is there 
that conceivable ground of distrust of God's love, 
which the incredulity of man's alienated heart 
could suggest, which is not anticipated and an- 
swered in this precious verse. 

Are we ready to plead, that ingratitude to the 
God of all our blessings so stares us in the face, 
that we feel it would be unwarrantable presump- 
tion to cherish the hope, that we can be the ob- 
jects of His love, whose goodness we have requited 



8 INTRODUCTORY ESSAY. 

with such ungrateful contempt and rebellion, as 
compel us to despise and loathe ourselves. This 
apparently most reasonable fear is silenced by the 
assurance, " Herein is love — not that we loved 
God." The want of our love to Him, that cursed 
consequence of the fall, which stamps on our apos- 
tate spirits the very brand of hell, is stated as being 
no bar to this display of God's love. Not that we 
loved God, but that He loved us ! Yes ! with all 
our ingratitude full before His view, though of its 
enormous extent and baseness He alone could 
form any adequate estimate — still He loved us ! 
with a love of compassion, of which we can give 
no other explanation than this — that with regard 
to His love, partaking so fully as it does of the un- 
fathomable mysteriousness of His nature, " His 
thoughts are not as our thoughts, nor His ways as 
our ways." 

Again, are we ready to indulge the apprehen- 
sion, which the consciousness of our un worthiness 
might well seem to warrant, that, though the com- 
passion of our offended God might dispose Him to 
grant us some trifling boon, some gift of little 
worth, still we dare not look for any great or pre- 
cious tokens of His love. Oh ! how is this appre- 
hension not merely answered, but overpowered 
into rapturous wonder, by the amazing declara- 
tion, " He so loved us that He gave His Son, His 
own, His only, His well-beloved Son ! His co- 
eternal and co-equal Son I One with Himself 
from everlasting — gave Him— the greatest gift 
of His love even in His power to bestow. Oh is 



INTRODUCTORY ESSAY. 9 

not the appeal unanswerable ! What coula He 
have done, to convince us of His love, more than 
He has done ? What could He have given, 
dearer or more precious to Him, than His own, 
His only Son ? Can we now wonder at the 
Apostle's exclamation, " Herein is love !" 

But we have not yet arrived at the full de- 
velopment of the love of God which this verse dis* 
plays ! There are depths in it yet to be fathomed : 
there are heights in it yet to be scaled ; and still, 
and throughout eternity, there will remain in the 
love of God to man, which this verse reveals 
heights, which will be for ever unsc ale able b} 
created intellects — depths, which can never be 
fathomed by finite minds. 

Though the fears, arising from the conscious- 
ness of our ingratitude to God, might be thus 
silenced by the consideration of His infinite be- 
nignity and compassion, there is another aspect 
of the Divine character, which might well over- 
whelm us with the most overpowering alarm, and 
exclude the hope that God would ever lift up the 
light of his countenance upon us in love ! We 
might be ready, when we contemplate the blessed 
God as the Being, who loveth righteousness and 
hateth iniquity, to an infinite extent, and view 
ourselves as vile, polluted sinners, to exclaim, u It 
is impossible that a holy God could love such un- 
holy creatures as we must confess ourselves to be ! 
His holiness must constrain Him to hold us in per- 
fect abhorrence, as utterly loathsome in the eyes 
of His infinite purity ! Oh ! the depths of Divine 



10 INTRODUCTORY ESSAY. 

love ! What tongue of men or angels could speak 
aright of that most mysterious love of God, which 
here bursts on our view ! ' He loved us, and gave 
His own Son, as a propitiation for our sins !' " 
Yes ! our sinfulness, the very object which we 
might so justly have feared would have shut us 
out for ever from the smallest manifestation of the 
love of God, is the very object, from which He 
takes occasion, while displaying, in the strongest 
possible manner, His holy abhorrence of sin, to 
exhibit towards sinners the greatest possible proof 
of His love, even in His power to bestow ! 

It is because we have sinned against Him, and 
were, as sinners, exposed to a righteous sentence 
of eternal condemnation, and must, therefore, un- 
less an adequate atonement should be offered, to 
make the exercise of mercy compatible with the 
claims of justice, have perished everlastingly j it 
is for this very reason, that loving us with an un- 
bounded love, and seeing that no creature, how- 
ever highly exalted, could offer a sufficient satis- 
faction to His offended justice on our behalf, 
therefore He gave His own co- eternal and co- 
equal Son, as a propitiation for our sins ! 

It is manifest that this at once silences every 
objection derived from our sinfulness, and magni- 
fies the love of God to the utmost conceivable 
extent ; for here, so far is our sinfulness from be- 
ing represented as an insuperable barrier to the 
manifestation of God's love, that it is actually ex 
hibited as having elicited the greatest possible 
exhibition of that love ; since, if we had not sin- 



INTRODUCTORY ESSAY. 11 

ned, we could not have required a propitiation ; 
and we may with reverence assert, that even the 
Everlasting Father himself could not give a 
greater proof of His love, than to give His own 
Son to he a propitiation for our sins. More espe 
cially, when we remember, that, in order to ofFei 
up such a propitiation, as would perfectly satisfy 
the demands of the insulted justice of Jehovah, 
the well-beloved Son of God must descend from 
the throne of His glory in heaven to the death of 
the cross on earth. 

What possible plea then is left, which the most, 
perverted ingenuity of man's incredulity can in- 
vent, for doubting the love of God ? Since, in 
confutation of the plea f we might have urged 
with most apparent reasonableness, even the fact, 
that we are sinners, and as such, unworthy of His 
love j Scripture assures us, that " herein God com- 
mendeth his love towards us," (sets it off by this 
most endearing consideration, which unspeakably 
enhances its value,) "that while we were yet sin- 
ners, He gave His own Son to die for our sins." 
Is it (for this would seem the only conceivable 
objection unanswered) — is it the greatness of our 
sins ? No ! for since He gave His own Son — the 
beloved of His bosom — the partner of His throne 
— One with Himself from everlasting ; since He 
gave Him as a propitiation for our sins, it mani- 
festly is not humility, but unbelief, offering the 
deepest insult to the Son of His love, to imagine 
that there could be any sins, no matter of how 
aggravated a character, or how deep a dye, foi 



12 INTRODUCTORY ESSAY. 

which that sacrifice must not be an infinitely suffi- 
cient expiation ! Yea, one which puts such infi 
nite honour on the justice whose claims it satisfies, 
and the law whose penalties it pays, that the par 
don, purchased at such a price, not merely com 
ports with, but even pours a brighter flood of 
glory round the character and government of 
God. 

Are then our trembling hearts ready to exclaim 
— <c Oh ! may we indeed be permitted, with an 
appropriating trust, to believe and confide in the 
iove of God, thus wondrously displayed?' 3 How 
delightfully encouraging, in answer to such an 
enquiry, the assurance, which the Scriptures so 
fully warrant, that not merely are we permitted, 
but even commanded thus to believe in the love 
of God, as manifested towards ourselves ! Yea, 
that to doubt that love is a suggestion of Satan, 
and in the highest degree sinful, and displeasing 
to God, because, now that God has declared His 
love towards us, by giving His own Son, as a pro- 
pitiation for our sins, to doubt it, after such a man- 
ifestation, is virtually to tell God, that nothing He 
could do, would be sufficient to convince us of 
His love ! And how could we offer him a greater 
affront than this J Or how 3ould He give us a 
stronger warrant to confide in His love, than to 
command us to do so, and to tell us, that it is in 
the highest degree sinful in His sight, to doubt or 
to distrust His love ? 

Thus every conceivable objection, which con- 
scious guilt could urge, is fully answered; and 



INTRODUCTORY ESSAY. IS 

every obstacle to the entrance of God's love ink: 
the heart of man entirely removed. I have dweli 
the more largely on this point, because, as I be- 
fore observed, the ultimate design of the Gospel- 
scheme, (intended as it is for the restoration of 
man to the glory and happiness which he lost b} 
the fall.) is the re-enthronement of the love of God 
in the heart of man, in the rightful sovereignty of 
which blessed principle over all the affections and 
appetites of his nature, we perceived the very es- 
sence of his happiness and his glory to consist ; 
and we also saw that, for the accomplishment of 
this purpose, the means employed were such a 
stupendous exhibition of the love of God, as, when 
cordially believed, cannot fail to win back to God 
the alienated heart of man. 

It seemed, therefore, important to show, that 
the manifestation of Divine love, which the Gos- 
pel-scheme unfolds, is admirably adapted to the 
end it is designed to accomplish : because it ex- 
hibits that love as clothed in a shape, (the gift of 
God's own Son, as a propitiation for our sins,) 
w T hich makes it the basest ingratitude to doubt 
God's love ; for, could we offer a deeper affront 
to God than to tell Him, that even the gift of his 
own Son, for such a purpose, has failed to convince 
us of His love 1 While, at the same time, as this 
gift, bestowed for such a purpose, presupposes our 
sinfulness, (which alone furnishes occasion for its 
exercise,) it provides unanswerable arguir ents foi 
snencing every objection, which the consc ousness 
of guilt could urge ; and as it comes th ough a 

2 



14 INTRODUCTORY ESSAY. 

channel, which glorifies the Divine character m 
the pardon of our sins, making our salvation, ef- 
fectuated through such a sacrifice as was offered 
on the cross, a means of promoting the glory of 
God, it sweetly satisfies us that God, in perfect 
consistency with His holiness, can look on us with 
love ; and thus it supplies the most abundant en- 
trance to the love of God, to come and take up its 
abode in the human heart, and dwell and reign 
there, opening a paradise, yea, a heaven, in that 
heart for ever. 

The unspeakable importance of thus believing 
God's love is obvious from this — that, as soon as 
a cordial belief that, through the propitiation of- 
fered up on our behalf by His beloved Son, God 
is reconciled to us, and forgives us all our iniqui- 
ties, and regards us with complacency, as the 
children of His love ; as soon as a cordial belief 
of this glorious truth is shed abroad in our hearts 
by the Holy Ghost, gratitude to the God of our 
salvation immediately is implanted there, and be- 
comes thenceforth the very soul of our souls ; the 
seminal principle of all acceptable obedience ; the 
germ from which grow all the fruits of righteous- 
ness, and true holiness; the fountain from which 
all gracious affections and dispositions, all renewed 
tastes and tempers, flow. From this Divine foun- 
tain, thus opened in our hearts, flows an inextin- 
guishable abhorrence of sin — for when God is sin- 
cerely loved, we must hate sin — the abominable 
thing which He hates, and which is the very con- 
centration of enmity against Himself, rebellion 



INTRODUCTORY ESSAY. 15 

against His authority, ingratitude for His loving- 
kindness and hatred of all He holds dear. Sin— 
whose unutterable hatefulness is so awfully written 
in the agony and bloody sweat, the cross and pas- 
sion of God's well-beloved Son ! Surely if there 
be any one truth revealed in Scripture, with such 
clearness that he who runs may read, it is, that 
the love of God and the love of sin cannot dwell 
together in the same breast Oh! no! it is for 
the very purpose of dethroning the love, and de- 
stroying the dominion of sin — and of enthroning 
the love and establishing the empire of holiness in 
the believer's heart, that God, the Holy Ghost, 
takes up His abode there, as the Sanctifier and 
Comforter, and by His Divine presence and influ- 
ences, consecrating his body as a temple of the 
living God, and renewing his soul, in the Divine 
image, in righteousness and true holiness, makes 
the heir of glory meet for the holy service, and the 
holy heaven of a holy God. 

The love of God, when it is enthroned in our 
hearts, will also produce the most unhesitating 
obedience to His commandments, and the most 
unmurmuring resignation to His will : for how can 
we hesitate to obey any of His commandments, 
or acquiesce in any of His appointments, when we 
regard them all alike as the expressions of an in- 
finitely wise and tender Father's love, who cannot 
be mistaken as to the best » *eans of advancing our 
real welfare, for He is infinite in wisdom — who 
cannot be frustrated in any of His plans, for He is 
infinite in power — who cannot, without a horrible 



16 INTRODUCTORY ESSAY. 

libel on His character, be supposed to take plea- 
sure in inflicting on us unnecessary pain, for, (in- 
dependently of His infinite benevolence, which al- 
together precludes the insulting supposition,) He 
so loved us, as to give His own Son to the death 
of the cross, to save us from eternal sufferings ; 
and who cannot, without the most monstrous in- 
gratitude and affront to that Son, be suspected of 
withholding from us any real blessing in His 
power to bestow, seeing He withheld not even 
Him — but delivered Him up as a propitiation for 
our sins ! — how then shall He not (oh ! blessed 
impossibility), " how shall He not with him also 
freely give us all things?" 

Nor should another precious fruit of this celes 
tial plant be omitted ; even that, when the love 
of God in Christ reigns supreme in the heart, 
there is always kindled in the soul, by the Holy 
Spirit, a heavenly flame of fervent zeal for God's 
honour, which prompts the grateful believer to 
consecrate all the powers of his mind, and mem- 
bers of his body, as instruments of righteousness, 
for the advancement of the glory of God ! Then 
are the words — " Hallowed be thy name — -Thy 
kingdom come — Thy will be done on earth, as it 
is in heaven" — so often, while he was a strange? 
to the love of God, repeated with the most in- 
sulting mockery of the Most High, then are those 
words the honest language of his heart, whose 
supreme solicitude is now centred on the advance- 
ment of his Heavenly Father's glory, u to which 
every other wish and anxiety of his soul are sub- 



INTRODUCTORY ESSAY. 17 

<>*dF»ate, and every plan and purpose of his life 
vranged in grateful subserviency to this end." 

To contribute, to the utmost extent of his 
-Mfluence and resources, towards the accomplish- 
ment of this object, becomes the dearest desire of 
his renewed heart; to this all his time, all his 
talents, are gladly and gratefully devoted. He 
feels it to be indeed his bounden duty to do so; 
but he feels also that it is something even nobler 
and sweeter than this — that it is his most exalted 
privilege — the source of the highest honour and 
happiness that can be conferred upon him, to be 
permitted to be, in any, even the humblest mea- 
sure, instrumental in advancing the glory of his 
God. 

In this sentiment of holy zeal for God's glory, 
are combined whatever is most ennobling and 
attractive in loyalty to the most munificent of 
sovereigns, and love to the tenderest of fathers, 
and gratitude to the most generous of benefac- 
tors. Every gift, whether of natural or acquired 
endowment, which the bounty of God has bes- 
towed — every channel of influence or source of 
enjoyment which the providence of God has 
opened — all, all are prized by one who loves God 
in Christ, exactly in the proportion in which they 
can be made to administer to the advancement 
of His glory. 

This sentiment invests the humblest Chris- 
tian's character with a dignity, immeasurably 
higbsr than belongs to the mightiest monarch of 
the earth in whose heart the love of God is not 

2* 



18 INTRODUCTORY ESSAY. 

enthroned. It links him as a fellow-labourei 
with the most exalted of created beings, for the 
attainment of the noblest of ends — for it associ- 
ates him with cherubim, and seraphim, and all 
the host of heaven, in labours of grateful zeal for 
the advancement of that end, to which they in- 
variably devote their immortal energies — the 
glory of God. 

Does not, then, the love of God, when reign- 
ing in rightful supremacy over the Christian's 
heart, fling round him a grandeur that is not of 
the earth, but bears the very impress of heaven? 

Its possessor may be a Lazarus at some rich 
man's gate, the object of the mingled scorn and 
compassion of the wealthy worldlings, who, as 
they roll past him in their chariots of state, look 
down on him with contempt, as a creature of an 
inferior grade in existence to themselves ; yet 
does he rank as much above them in the estima- 
tion of Jehovah, as the heavens are higher than 
the earth. 

Nor does this enthronement of God in the 
heart of man minister less to his own enjoyment, 
than to his zeal for God's glory ; or conduce less 
to his happiness than to his holiness, so far as 
we can draw a distinction between holiness and 
happiness, which are, in fact, but two different 
names for one and the same thing ; for, by an 
immutable constitution of a holy God, immutable, 
because His glory would be sullied by a change 
in such an appointment, He has made it ecmally 



INTRODUCTORY ESSAY. 19 

impossible, to be happy without being holy, or to 
be holy without being happy ! 

The consciousness of possessing the friendship 
of the greatest and best of beings — of Him whose 
loving-kindness is better than the life, and whose 
smile gives to angels all their joy, and heaven all 
its glory — the conviction that we have concentra- 
ted our supreme affections on the one only Object, 
infinitely woithy of them, and capable of satisfy- 
ing their most exalted and enlarged desires — the 
feeling that we are linked, in a bond of holy bro- 
therhood, with all the pure and glorious intel- 
ligences throughout the universe, who live in 
the light of God's countenance, and rejoice to do 
His will — the perception that the Holy Spirit has 
already traced in our souls the lineaments of the 
Divine image, modelled after the Saviour's, how- 
ever faint as yet may be the resemblance — and 
the assurance that that image shall yet be per- 
fectly stamped on our glorified spirits, without 
spot or wrinkle, or any such thing, in the smallest 
degree to disfigure the beauty of perfect holiness 
— the knowledge that all our faculties are conse- 
crated to the service of the best of masters, and 
the advancement of the noblest of ends, and the 
assurance that our safety and happiness, for time 
and for eternity, are as secure in the hands of a 
covenant-keeping God, as His infinite wisdom, 
power, and love can make them — therefore as 
secure as our hearts could possibly desire — and all 
the pure pleasures which flow through the sacred 
channels of prayer, and the Holy Scriptures, and 



20 INTRODUCTORY ESSAY. 

the services of the Sabbath, especially the Sacra 
mental Commemoration of the Redeemer's dying 
love, that sweetest foretaste to the believer of the 
blessedness of sitting down, with all the members 
of his mystical body, at the Marriage Supper of 
the Lamb — all this for present possession ; and 
then for future prospects, the promises of that God 
who cannot lie, that, throughout the endless ages 
of eternity, we shall be rejoicing in His presence 
with joy unspeakable and full of glory — uniting 
with angels and archangels, and all the company 
of heaven, in the songs and services of the celes- 
tial sanctuary, joining with all that we have loved 
in Christ, and with all the ranks of the redeemed, 
n ascribing everlasting praise to Him that sitteth 
upon the throne, and to the Lamb — even the 
Lamb that was slain for us : if these be the bles- 
sed fruits of the love of God, planted in our hearts 
by the Holy Ghost, oh ! may not that principle 
indeed be said to open in our hearts a little 
heaven ? 

Nor should it be forgotten, that from the love 
of God thus shed abroad in the heart by the Holy 
Ghost, flows that principle of christian philanthro- 
py, and brotherly love, which constrains the be- 
liever to labour to the uttermost to be like the God 
he loves, in diffusing happines, temporal and 
eternal, as far as his influence extends. The 
grateful child of God feels the full force of that 
beautiful exclamation of the Apostle, " Beloved ! 
if God so loved us, we ought also to love one 
another »" Having contemplated, with adoring 



INTRODUCTORY ESSAY. 21 

g latitude, the stupendous love, displayed in his 
redemption, he is inflamed with an unquenchable 
desire to drink every day more deeply into the 
spirit of that love, which shines forth, with such 
surpassing glory, round Calvary's cross, to become 
more closely conformed to the character of Him, 
who was the incarnate manifestation of Divine 
love, to walk more faithfully in the footsteps of 
Him, who went about doing good, and thus by 
the exhibitions of a temper, modelled after the 
loving Saviour's and implanted by that Spirit, who 
descended on Jesus in the form of a dove ; by 
every work and labour of love, which gratitude to 
•a Saviour-God will promote, and by the zealous 
and liberal support of every society, and insti- 
tution, w r hich are established and calculated to 
advance at once the happiness of man, and the 
glory of God, to become instrumental in soothing 
human suffering, and augmenting human happi- 
ness, and through the medium of a character, living 
in an element of divine love, pervading all its 
inward feelings, and outward movements, to be 
made a benefactor and a blessing to mankind. 

If the truth of these observations be admitted, 
it is manifest that no style of work can be more 
directly calculated to promote at once the glory 
of God, and the happiness of man, than that 
which exhibits, in the most attractive form, the 
love of God to man, and thus prepares the way 
for the enthronement in the human heart of that 
love of man to God, which we have seen to be nt 
once the seminal principle of all true holiness 



22 atDljOTORY ESSAY. 

and the only spring of satisfying and abiding hap 
piness: and it is this which invests with such a 
peculiar charm, and stamps with such a peculiar 
value, the work to which we have prefixed these 
prefatory observations. 

It bears the unequivocal marks of being writ- 
ten by one, who had felt, in the inmost recesses 
of his heart, the full power of that brief but most 
beautiful delineation of the Divine character, 
drawn by the hands of the Apostle of love, when 
Hs says, " God is love !" And it would appear 
impossible to read it with a devout spirit, without 
feeling attracted in love and adoration towards 
this blessed Being, who is thus exhibited as bear- 
ing a nature and a name, so afFectingly calculated 
to win for Him the warmest love and confidence 
of the human heart. 

This delightful conviction and exhibition of the 
glorious truth, that " God is love," pervades the 
whole volume, running, like a golden thread, 
through the entire texture of the work. The 
stamp of heavenly love is exhibited in every fea- 
ture of the stupendous scheme of our salvation 
We are constantly reminded that love is the foun 
tain from which it flows, and that the medium by 
which it is accomplished is the incarnation of Di- 
vine love. Love is shown to be the essential 
spirit of the Saviour's character — love, the ani- 
mating motive which impelled Him to undertake 
the work of man's redemption — love, the sustaining 
principle which upheld Him, amidst all the strug 
gles and sorrows of that arduous work — love, bot* 



INTRODUCTORY ESSAY. 2& 

the soul and substance of the religion He de* 
scended from on high to establish upon earth — 
and love, the very element and atmosphere of 
that heaven, to which He will conduct all His 
faithful followers, when they have finished their 
painful pilgrimage in this vale of tears. 

To a believer's heart there is something delight- 
fully infectious in continually breathing such an 
atmosphere as pervades this work. It is not pos- 
sible to do so, without catching something of its 
contagious influence, and thus having the temper 
and character imbued with that spirit of love, 
which most of all assimilates the human nature 
to the divine. 

The history which the author has selected for 
the exemplification of the glorious truth, which 
thus invests the character of God, and of the reli- 
gion which has emanated from Him, with such 
divine attractiveness, is one admirably adapted 
for this purpose — the history of that family of 
Bethany, of whom, in one short sentence, we are 
told enough to assure us, that there was not then, 
on the face of the earth a more honoured or a 
happier family; for St. John tells us, "that Jesus 
loved Martha, and her sister, and Lazarus." Vol- 
umes could not do more than this single verse has 
done to convince us, that in the abode of this fam- 
ily, (if no where else on earth,) a type or minia- 
ture of heaven was to be found — a counterpart 
both of the character and happiness of heaven's 
inhabitants ; for could Jesus thus love any, who had 
not imbibed the spirit of His own character, (that 



24 INTRODUCTORY ESSAY. 

is, the spirit of heaven,) so as to make them con* 
genial companions, bosom friends for the Savioui 
of mankind ; and what could be said of the hap- 
piness of the highest of the host of heaven more 
than this — that Jesus loves them ! Is not this the 
source, the concentration, the climax of all their 
joy? 

Into the bosom of this highly-favoured family 
we are introduced by the interesting work before 
us, guided by the exquisitely attractive narrative 
recorded in the 1 1th chapter of St. John's Gos- 
pel; and truly we are made to feel, while reading 
it, that when Jesus came to visit that humble 
abode of those He loved, He brought heaven with 
Him into the hearts of its inmates, for He brought 
thither the presence of Him, in whose presence 
consists the fulness of heaven's joy. 

The characters of the two sisters are delineated 
with (rreat power of discrimination. The few 
touches which the Apostle has given are beauti- 
fully rilled up into a more finished portraiture of 
their peculiar features; and strikingly is the con- 
trast drawn between the ardent, impassioned, 
precipitate Martha, and the calm, gentle, tender 
Mary; the love of the former rushing like a tor- 
rent, strong, indeed, but impetuous and troubled 
in its course ; the love of the latter flowing like a 
deep river, in silent strength, pure, peaceful, and 
profound ; or, as the contrast is described with 
singular felicity in this work, in two short senten- 
ces, " Martha is the St. Peter, Mary the St. John 
of her sex." Could any thing more happily inns' 



INTRODUCTORY ESSAY. 25 

Irate the difference of the two sisters — the one all 
ardent zeal, the other all seraphic love ? 

But with whatever of force or beauty the 
subordinate personages may be delineated, the 
figure of the Saviour himself always appears as 
the principal object in the foreground of the pic- 
ture, arrayed in all the mingled majesty and ten- 
derness which formed the distinguished character- 
istics of the Divine Philanthropist ! Every 
feature wears the expression, every word breathes 
the spirit, every action bears the impress of in- 
carnate love ! This encompasses Him as a 
celestial atmosphere ; this encircles Him as a 
celestial halo, throwing round all He says and 
does a grace and a glory which are indeed divine ! 
You cannot follow Him, step by step, through 
the various scenes of this peculiarly interesting 
narrative, from the moment when the sisters of 
Lazarus sent to Him that touching message, 
11 Lord, he whom thou lovest is sick," till the mo- 
ment when, in the majesty of omnipotence, He 
cried, "Lazarus! come forth!" without feeling, 
with a force which supersedes the necessity of 
laboured demonstration in its proof, that you are 
following the footsteps of Deity — that Jesus was 
" God manifest in the flesh," and that " God is 
love." The more closely you watch the develop- 
ment of His character, as exhibited in those 
movements or observations, which disclosed what 
is passing within His breast, the more fully are 
you convinced that you are contemplating the 
character, that you are listening to the voice, of 

3 



26 INTRODUCTORY ESSAY. 

the incarnate God. And it is perhaps the pecu- 
liar charm of this volume, that the author, in 
commenting on the character of the Saviour, as 
developed in this narrative, appears to have 
deeply imbibed the spirit of the beloved disciple ; 
so that, while reading the reflections brought 
before us in this work, we feel, as it were, permit- 
ted to look down into the depths of the Redeem- 
er's heart, and catch a glimpse of the ineffable 
love to His people which perpetually glows there, 
and prompts every movement of His providential 
arrangements on their behalf And thus the 
most afflictive of His chastening dispensations 
are seen to emanate as directly from that love, 
and to bear its stamp as deeply impressed on 
them, as those apparently kinder appointments, 
by which, when compatible with their eternal 
welfare, He delights to crown His people's earthly 
hopes with the largest measure of purified earthly 
enjoyment. Now we know of nothing more 
powerfully calculated to produce and maintain, 
in the afflicted Christian's soul, that spirit of 
cheerful and thankful resignation, which brings at 
once such glory to his God, and such peace to his 
own heart, than the fully realized and abidingly 
cherished conviction, that all the dealings of his 
Saviour- God with him, however they may differ 
as to their external aspect, are all alike the 
. manations and expressions of His infinite love ! 
Mat the dispensations which that love appoints 
nay be continually changing, like the alternations 
o«' light and shade, as His infinite wisdom may 



INTRODUCTORY ESSAY. 2? 

see to be most conducive, by their change, to His 
people's spiritual welfare, but still the love itself 
changeth not ; for with it is " no variableness, 
neither shadow of turning j" but it endureth from 
everlasting to everlasting ; like Himself, " the 
same yesterday, to-day, and for ever." 

Oh yes ! it is indeed a blessed frame for a 
believer's mind, (and assuredly it ought to be its 
abiding frame,) when he is enabled to repose in 
his Redeemer's love, with a confidingness which 
no trials can shake, and to acquiesce in His ap- 
pointments, with a satisfaction which no afflictions 
can disturb ; and when, whatever that Redeem- 
er's appointments as to his earthly circumstances 
may be, whether He is pleased to prosper or to 
defeat his best concerted plans, to realize or 
disappoint his most fondly cherished hopes, to 
give or to take away what most he desires or 
loves, he is a Je, with equal gratitude of heart, to 
bless "the name of the Lord!" And is it not 
strange, (and oh what a melancholy proof, how 
imperfectly his nature is, as yet renewed,) that 
after having once been privileged to read, with a 
believing heart, the records of that love, as con- 
tained in the scenes exhibited in Gethsemane's 
garden, and on Calvary's cross, he should ever 
feel the smallest difficulty in reposing in the Re- 
deemer's love, with such confidingness, and in 
His appointments with such resignation. It is 
true, we are so habituated to associate with the 
very name of love the idea of doing all within 
our power to avert the sufferings, gratify the 



28 INTRODUCTORY ESSAY. 

wishes, and thus promote the happiness of the 
beloved object, that we find it at times hard to 
believe — yea, it is confessedly a noble triumph of 
faith, with unwavering confidence, to feel assured 
that when the hand of a Saviour-God is stretched 
forth to cross all our favourite plans — even those 
that were arranged most faithfully, as we fancied, 
for the advancement of His glory, and to blight 
all our dearest hopes — even those which we 
cherished in the sweetest spirit of submission to 
His will — it is love, the very tenderest, fondest 
love, which directs its very movement. And yet, 
did we but reason and feel as, if Christians in 
more than name, we ought to do, we would find 
it much harder to believe, that any thing but such 
love could direct a single movement of the Sa 
viour's hand, in any of His appointments, how- 
ever afflictive, on behalf of his own beloved peo- 
ple ; of those so inconceivably dear to Sim, 
that He did not deem even the sacrifice of His 
own life, the pouring out of his own blood, amidst 
all the ignominy and agony of the death of. the 
sross, too costly a price at which to purchase their 
eternal happiness — too vast a sacrifice, by which 
to testify the boundlessness of His love. 

We do not deny that the dispensations which 
He appoints may often, to our short-sighted facul- 
ties, appear very mysterious ; that His footsteps 
are often in the sea, and His paths in the deep 
waters, where His design cannot be traced: but 
oh ! might we not expect that the same confiding- 
ness which is reposed in well-tried earthly afFec- 



INTRODUCTORY ESSAY. 29 

tion, should be reposed in His ; that its tender- 
ness might be trusted, even when its plans could 
not be traced ; and that any suspicious doubts 
which the apparent severity of his dealings might 
awaken, would be at once put to flight by the re- 
membrance of what passed in the garden of Geth- 
semane, and all painful perplexity changed into 
cheerful acquiescence, by His own assurance to 
Peter — " What I do, thou knowest not now, but 
thou shalt know hereafter." Yes ! I cannot but 
feel persuaded, that if believers were more in the 
habit of devoutly dwelling on the contemplation 
of the infinite love and infinite wisdom of their 
Saviour-God, they would be able to exhibit, under 
the pressure of heavy trials, a spirit more suitable 
to the exalted privileges which they possess^ and 
more calculated to honour Him in the eyes of the 
children of the world. 

The language, not merely of their lips, but of 
their heart and life, amidst the most painful or 
perplexing dispensations, by which He might see 
fit to try their faith and patience, would in spirit 
be habitually this — When I look at the cross, and 
remember who it is that is there offering up Him- 
self, amidst the lingering tortures of its agonizing 
death, as a sacrifice for my sins, and to secure my 
salvation, I dare not doubt His love — I feel it 
would be the basest ingratitude to wound it b v 
one dishonouring doubt, written, as it is, in His 
tears, and agonies, and blood. Oh ! then, what a 
heart must mine be, if I can refuse to trust in it 
with the most unsuspecting confidingness, aye 

3* 



30 INTRODUCTORY ESSAY. 

though it should appoint for me trials, beyond aL 
which ever yet were appointed for any child of 
man ! True, this is a most perplexing dispensa- 
tion. I cannot fully fathom its deep design. It 
so crushes my spirit — it so wounds my heart in 
the very tenderest point — it so dries up the source 
of all my earthly happiness, and gives such a 
wilderness aspect to the world. But oh ! unbe- 
lieving, ungrateful heart, though thou canst not 
trace, art thou unwilling to trust a Saviour's love? 
May I not feel assured, that this is precisely the 
trial which is best suited to my spiritual condition 
since it is the one which Infinite Wisdom ha& 
chosen ; and is that a wisdom which can by possi 
bility be mistaken ? Is the child to dictate to the 
parent, what discipline to adopt in training him 
up for future usefulness ? Is the patient to pre* 
scribe to the physician, what remedies to employ 
for the accomplishment of his recovery? And 
shall I dictate to the only wise God, my Saviour, 
what course of corrective discipline He ought to 
adopt, in training me up for my purchased inheri- 
tance of glory? Shall I prescribe to the Heavenly 
Physician, what remedies He ought to employ, to 
accomplish my spiritual cure ? And if His dis- 
cipline be stricter, or His remedies more painful 
than is palatable to flesh and blood, oh ! shall I 
therefore question His love, or quarrel with His 
appointments ? 

But is the dispensation indeed so mysterious, 
that I cannot trace, amidst its dark perplexity, the 
footsteps of a faithful covenant-keeping God ? Is 



INTRODUCTORY ESSAY, 3i 

the gloom, that overshadows my path, so deep, so 
dense, that no cheering rays of divine light break 
through and brighten it with even the passing 
gleam of a Saviour's smile ? Is the storm of afflic- 
tion so loud, and so uninterrupted, that I never hear, 
amidst the pauses of the blast, a voice that softly 
whispers, u God is love ?" Oh ! surely I cannot say 
this. Yea, must I not thankfully acknowledge, that 
?ven already I have had abundant cause to con- 
fess, " It is good for me that I have been afflicted ;" 
and to cherish an humble confidence, that all the 
blessings, which I have derived from sanctified 
sorrows, have been but the first-fruits of a rich 
harvest of eternal glory % 

And oh 1 how precious have those first-fruits 
been! What ineffably sweet communion with 
my Saviour-God have I enjoyed, since He allured 
me into the wilderness, and there spake comfort- 
ably to me ! What increased experience of the 
.enderness of His sympathy, the preciousness of 
His consolations 1 Oh ! should I have been well 
satisfied to have passed through even deeper 
waters of affliction than I have encountered, if I 
could only thus have learned, as this trial has 
taught me, how a Saviour-God can and will sup- 
port His people in their day of trouble % And 
what fountains of consolation, sweeter than I ever 
before tasted, or even in imagination conceived^ 
have prayer and the Scriptures proved, since this 
afflictive dispensation drove me to seek in them 
refreshment for my fainting soul 1 Moreover as 
earth has been darkened, has not heaven looked 



32 INTRODUCTORY ESSAY. 

brighter to my view ? Has not the bufTeting of 
the storm endeared to me the prospect of the 
haven where I would be ; and the wearisomeness 
of the journey made sweeter still the thoughts of 
my heavenly home ? Have not my affections, 
desires, and hopes, oftener soared up, with heaven- 
ward flight, since the chains of earthly attractions, 
which bound them down to the dust, have been 
broken by the hand of affliction ? And shall not 
I bless the stroke, which thus emancipated my 
earth-enthralled spirit, and gave it liberty to mount 
up, as on eagle's wings, to its native skies? 

Has not the furnace of affliction also proved to 
my soul a purifying furnace, by which the sullying 
defilements of inward corruption, which lurked 
unsuspected in the recesses of my heart, were dis- 
covered and purged away in its refining fires ? 
So that if, by divine grace I am enabled in any, 
even the faintest degree, to reflect my adorable 
Redeemer's image, I am mainly indebted to the 
refining process, which has been thus carried on 
by the Holy Spirit in my soul. And could I wish 
that the fire had been less hot, if thereby less of the 
defilement of sin would have been purged away, 
and less of the image of the Saviour reflected in 
my soul ? And have I not had opportunities of 
glorifying Him who died for me, placed within 
my reach by this agonizing trial, immeasurably 
more precious, than the most unclouded prosperity 
eould ever have supplied 1 Oh ! if I may but in- 
dulge the delightful hope, that some careless sin- 
ner has been converted, or some sorrowing saint 



INTRODUCTORY ESSAY. 33 

comforted, by what they have seen of a Saviour's 
faithfulness and love, as exhibited in the strength 
and consolation He has so graciously imparted to 
me, in my time of trial, should I not thank God 
for the dispensation, which, even by the desola- 
tion of my dearest earthly hopes, has enabled 
me to promote the glory of that beloved Savioar- 
God, to whom I am exclusively indebted for the 
hope, full of immortality — the hope of eternal 
happiness in heaven? 

Surely, even these considerations are sufficient 
to constrain me to cry out to my covenant-God, 
" I know that in very faithfulness Thou has af- 
flicted me ;" or, if any shadows of obscurity still 
hang over His dispensations, may I not cheerfully 
wait for the revelations of that brighter world, 
where, in His light, I shall see light poured, in 
full splendour, on the entire of the path, by which 
He led me through the wilderness to his own pre- 
sence in glory ! Then will I fully understand the 
loving-kindness of the Lord, in all His dealings 
with me here below. Then will I clearly see, 
(what it is now at once my privilege and duty cheer- 
fully to believe,) that not a passing cloud has ever 
darkened my path — not a single thorn ever pierced 
my feet, but was appointed by a Saviour's hand, 
in the very tenderness and faithfulness of His love. 
Then, (when the light of heaven is flashed on the 
scenes of earth,) will I see stamped on this very 
dispensation, in celestial characters, the divine in« 
scription, " God is love." Then will I perceive 
how necessary a link it formed, in that chain of 



34 INTRODUCTORY ESSAY. 

providential arrangements, by which He was 
graciously drawing up my heart from the creature 
to Himself, from earth to heaven, and thus mak- 
ing me meet for the everlasting enjoyment of 
Himself; and the very trial, which now calls forth 
my bitterest tears of anguish, will then call forth 
my sweetest songs of gratitude and joy. 

Reflections such as these, so full of happy com- 
fort, are suggested in the work to which these ob- 
servations are prefixed, in a most attractive man- 
ner, additionally recommended, if such recom- 
mendation be required, by the charms of a 
chastely beautiful style, and that powerfully 
persuasive species of eloquence, which, obviously 
coming from the heart, makes its way irresistibly 
to the heart. It is this which is calculated to 
make this volume so peculiarly acceptable to those 
mourners in Zion, whose pathway through this 
world's wilderness is overshadowed with the 
gloom of earthly affliction. It exhibits in such 
glowing colours the divine attractions of the re- 
ligion of the Gospel, the unchangeableness and 
unboundedness of the Redeemer's love to His peo- 
ple, and the endearing tenderness of His character, 
as to force on the afflicted Christian the delightful 
conviction, that all his sorrows are but so man) 
proofs of the faithfulness of that love, which led the 
Son of God to endure for his sake all the sufferings 
of His afflicted life, and agonizing death ; that 
there is a need-be for them all : and that the gra- 
cious design and glorious result of all his appointed 
trials is to promote his own conformity to the Divine 



INTRODUCTORY ESSAY. 35 

image, and the glory of the God of his salvation. 
And this conviction must powerfully tend vo pro- 
duce the most cheerful willingness to commit to a 
Saviour's disposal the arrangement of all the 
events of this life, and to receive from a Saviour's 
hands, without one rebellious murmur, and drink 
without one repining tear, yea, even with a thank- 
ful smile, the bitterest cup of trial He may be 
pleased to prepare and present to the object of 
His everlasting love. 

There is another most important lesson enforc- 
ed in this interesting work, which stamps on it 
peculiar value, in a professing age like the present 
— a lesson, which we cannot but fear many a 
high-toned professor of our day has yet to learn — 
even that the clearest views of evangelical truth, 
if they are unproductive of cordial and supreme 
love to a Saviour- God, are utterly unavailing to 
the everlasting salvation of the soul. 

In unfolding the characters of the members of 
the family of Bethany, as developed in the touch 
ing narrative of the Apostle, the reflections intro- 
duced by the author of this work are admirably 
calculated to deepen the impression which it ap- 
pears to be always the design of St. John to make 
<tm the mind of his reader, that the very essence 
of a believer's happiness consists in loving the 
Saviour, even as God alone deserves to be loved, 
with the whole heart, and soul, and mind, and 
strength. 

When introduced into the bosom of this happy 
family, we are made to feel that it is a happy 



36 INTRODUCTORY ESSAY. 

family, because the love of Jesus is enthroned in 
the heart of each of its members. This hallowed 
affection was indeed modified in its exhibition, by 
the different constitutional temperament of tA» 
individuals who composed the highly -favoured Cxi- 
cle but whether it displayed itself in the impe 
tuous eagerness of Martha, hastening with over 
anxious solicitude, to prepare the choicest viands 
she could procure, to mark her esteem and affec- 
tion for her Divine Guest, or in the calm and 
devout demeanour of Mary, sitting in humble 
docility at her Divine Master's feet; it was alike 
love, the purest, deepest, most grateful love to 
Jesus, which reigned in the bosom, and prompted 
the movements of them both. And while, from 
the gentle rebuke addressed to the one, and the 
affectionate commendation bestowed on the other, 
we are impressively taught, that the most grati- 
fying proof which we can give of our love to 
Jesus, is to sit at His feet in the lowly attitude of 
humble disciples, listening with devout attention 
to the gracious words which proceed out of His 
mouth ; still we cannot for a moment doubt, that 
He, who knew the heart, as only its Creator could 
have known it, regarded with mingled compla- 
cency and compassion the struggle of feelings in 
the ardent and anxious Martha's breast, viewing, 
with condescending approbation, the motive from 
which her over-cumbered care in preparing for 
His entertainment flowed ; while, in the faithful- 
ness of divine love, He rebuked the mixture of 
infirmity which was exhibited in her mode of 



INTRODUCTORY ESSAY. 3? 

displaying her reverence and affection for Him- 
self. 

Now, in an age like the present, when, from 
the increased spread of evangelical preaching, 
there is such an increased knowledge and profes- 
sion of evangelical religion, it is of paramount 
importance to have the solemn reflection frequent- 
ly and forcibly impressed upon the mind, that the 
most correct apprehensions, the soundest form, 
the loudest profession, and the warmest advo- 
cacy of evangelical truth, in the absence of 
warm, heartfelt, life-influencing love to a Saviour- 
God, are, in His estimation, nothing worth. Yea, 
that the most splendid sacrifices, the most unwea- 
ried labours, if they are not sacrifices of thanks- 
giving, and labours of love, are utterly valueless 
in His sight, who says to each of His intelligent 
creatures, and with emphatic urgency of appeal 
to each individual to whom He has made known 
the revelation of His Redeeming love, " Give me 
thine heart ;" and who, if that appeal be not an- 
swered through the Almighty power of the Holy 
Spirit, by the unreserved surrender of the heart to 
Him, will reject all our heartless services with 
infinite abhorrence, and banish us from the light 
of His countenance into the blackness of dark- 
ness for ever ! 

Oh ! we do feel it to be of immense importance 
to have the conviction powerfully forced upon the 
mind, that, for the want of cordial supreme love 
to Jesus, there is nothing that can compensate in 
the eyes of Him, who, to win our love, laid down 

4 



38 INTRODUCTORY ESSAY. 

His life for us! — that, while the homage of the 
heart is withheld, it matters not what homage the 
understanding, the lips, or even the life may pay : 
while, on the other hand, when the love of the 
Saviour is really enthroned in the heart, there may 
be much weakness of faith, and waywardness of 
feeling — the Redeemer's image may be clouded 
by the remaining corruption of a nature, imper- 
fectly renewed ; and the infirmities of the natural 
temper may, as in the case of Martha, break out 
in the very moment of displaying the grateful love, 
which the heart feels for the object of its supreme 
affections ; but still, if these corruptions and infir- 
mities are sincerely lamented and striven against, 
in the strength of divine grace, He, who readeth 
the heart, when He sees the love of Himself reign- 
ing in its rightful supremacy there, will graciously 
fling the robe of His own righteousness over every 
failing and imperfection of His faithful followers, 
and plead on their behalf, before the mercy-seat, 
that touchingly tender plea, " the spirit is willing, 
but the flesh is weak :" for His eye can pierce 
into the innermost recesses of the soul, and dis- 
cover the love, which, though for a season lulled 
to sleep, when it should have been most wakeful 
still lives in the heart of a sincere, though slum- 
bering disciple. 

We may be assisted in the consideration of this 
subject by the analogy of earthly affection ; for 
whatever differences in the mode of exhibiting real 
affection towards an earthly and visible, or a di- 
vine and invisible object, must necessarily exist 



INTRODUCTORY ESSAY. 39 

we may feel satisfied that our adorable Redeemer, 
by selecting the endearing relationships of earthly 
affection as images of His ineffable love, has war- 
ranted us to draw this inference from the illustra- 
tion — that we must not offer to Him. under the 
name of gratitude or love, what we would not 
think of offering to a fellow-worm, or what, if of- 
fered, would be rejected with scorn. What, then, 
is it, which alone stamps value on the external 
demonstrations of affection, which we receive from 
those we love? Is it not the love towards us, 
cherished in the inmost recesses of the heart, of 
which these outward exhibitions are the evidence 
and the fruit, and from which they derive all their 
signiflcancy, and all their charm? Could the 
most punctual obedience to his commands com- 
pensate to a fond father for the want of affection 
in the child, over whom his heart yearns in all the 
tenderness of parental love? Could the most un- 
limited compliance with his wishes impart a mo- 
mentary throb of pleasure to an attached husband's 
heart, if he were capable of looking into the heart 
of her on whom he had lavished all his love, and 
perceived its affections alienated from himself, 
and fixed on another ? Yea, would not her very 
compliance with his wishes under such circum- 
stances, inspire him only with indignation and dis- 
gust ? And will the Father of spirits be satisfied 
with that heartless service, which an earthly pa- 
rent would not accept? Will the Bridegroom of 
the Church be content with that constrained obe- 
dience of an alienated heart, which would be re 



40 INTRODUCTORY ESSAY. 

garde d, were it offered to an earthly object, with 
abhorrence and disdain 1 No. no. He, who, as 
our Creator, Preserver, Benefactor, but, above all, 
as our Redeemer, has entitled Himself, by claims 
stronger than can be urged even on angels, to the 
supreme affections of our hearts — He, who, to win 
our love, stooped from the height of His throne in 
heaven, even to the degradation of the death of 
the cross — He will never accept of any thing at 
our hands, in testimony of our acknowledgment of 
His claims, in lieu of our love. " If any man love 
not the Lord Jesus Christ, let him be anathema." 
is His own awful and irreversible decree ! No 
services we can render — no sufferings we can en- 
dure — will be looked on by Him with momentary 
complacency, if our hearts be withheld from Him ; 
but let these be once given freely, fully, unre- 
servedly to Him, and then there is not the feeblest 
effort we can make, or the slightest sacrifice we 
may submit to, in testimony of our love, which 
He will not graciously accept. Yea, such is the 
exuberance of His grace — which He will not 
richlv reward — for He has Himself declared, that 
even a cup of cold water, given in such a spirit* 
shall in no wise lose its reward. 

The indispensable necessity of this supreme 
;ove to the Saviour, as an evidence of the vitality 
of our faith in His blood, is powerfully enforced 
i'ii this valuable work ; as is also the all-important 
conviction, that the possession of this love is as 
indispensable for our own happiness, as it is for 
evidencing that our professed trust in the Re 



INTRODUCTORY ESSAY. 41 

deemer's righteousness is of the operation of the 
Spirit of God, proved to have emanated from a 
heavenly origin, by its bearing heavenly fruit. 

I cannot, indeed, conceive it possible to read 
this delightful volume with anything of the spirit 
ui which it appears manifestly to have been 
written, without feeling convinced in the heart, 
is well as the understanding, that he who sin- 
cerely and supremely loves the Lord Jesus Christ 
must be happy, be his earthly circumstances what 
they may : that he carries the essential element 
of true felicity within his own heart, so securely 
guarded from external assaults, by the omnipo- 
tent grace of the Holy Spirit, as to be altogether 
independent of the influence of any of the vicis- 
situdes or vexations of this mortal and miserable 
life. On the other hand, there is a spirit breath- 
ing throughout the whole work, which most im- 
pressively lifts up the voice of solemn warning in 
our ears, and tells us, that though we could speak, 
on divine themes, with more than earthly elo- 
quence, -and so abounded in the most ardent zeal, 
as to be willing to endure, in the cause of Christ, 
the most dreadful death that ever martyr suffered, 
and though we bore such a high and honourable 
name in the religious world, as to rank in its 
estimation but a little lower than the angels, and 
yet did not love the Lord Jesus Christ with a 
cordial, a supreme affection, real happiness must 
be a stranger to our hearts, both for time and for 
eternity. And oh ! what will it avail us to have 
ranked thus high in the estimation of those 

4* 



42 INTRODUCTORY ESSAY. 

around, and to have enjoyed, for a few fleeting 
years, a delusive hope of eternal happiness, ifj 
when we stand before Him, who sitteth upon the 
throne, we hear from His lips those tremendous 
words — ''Depart from Me! I never knew you! 
Depart, ye cursed, into everlasting fire !' 7 

Nor must I omit to mention, in bearing my 
humble testimony to the excellence of this work, 
that it discovers the most unequivocal marks of 
being written by one, who had felt with power, 
in his inmost soul, the import of that awful word 
— Eternity ! 

It flashes the light of eternity so vividly on the 
objects of time, that their comparative nothing- 
ness is not merely seen, but felt. One impression 
is irresistibly forced on our minds, that every 
consideration connected with our own welfare, is 
the merest trifle compared with the one question 
— Are we to be everlastingly happy or misera- 
ble ? — Are we to spend eternity in heaven or in 
hell? The Christian, as he peruses the author's 
reflections on the death and resurrection of Laz- 
arus, finds his thoughts and affections gradually 
drawn away from things seen, which are tem- 
poral, to things not seen, which are eternal. 
The glory of the upper sanctuary seems to break 
through the veil of mortality, which hides its full 
splendour from his view. Voices of more than 
mortal melody seem breathing in his ear some 
faint strains of that celestial chorus of praise, , 
round the throne of God, in which he hopes, ere 
.ong, to join with all the host of heaven ; and 



INTRODUCTORY ESSAY. 43 

thus, in the realizing anticipations of the glory to 
be revealed, he learns to estimate the things ot 
time at their true value ; and to regard all the 
events of this passing scene in their true light ; 
as deriving all their importance from their con- 
nexion with eternal things, their capability of 
being made instrumental in advancing the be- 
liever's progress in holiness, and the glory of a 
Saviour-God. 

Such seem to me to be some of the distin- 
guishing excellencies of this most valuable and 
interesting work ; a work so deeply imbued with 
the very spirit of the Gospel, (even the spirit of 
divine love, and peace, and joy,) that it can 
scarcely fail, (I think) of producing, even in a 
merely nominal Christian, the salutary conviction, 
that he who has found by experience the pre- 
ciousness of the Saviour and of His salvation, 
has found the secret of true happiness, the only 
happiness deserving of the earnest desires and 
pursuit of an immortal being; and it cannot, I 
feel assured, be perused prayerfully by a real 
Christian, seeking humbly to have the precious 
truths, which it sets forth, brought with power to 
the heart, by the Almighty energy of the Holy 
Ghost, without deepening in his heart every sen- 
timent of affection, confidence, and gratitude tc 
his adorable Redeemer; drawing him closer to 
the God of his salvation in the bonds of the ever- 
lasting covenant ; kindling every spark of devout 
lmm into a brighter and a warmer flame ; dispos- 
rig him, with more cheerful trust and submission, 



44 INTRODUCTORY ESSAY. 

to lie passive in His hands, having no wiT. but 
His ; inspiring him with more ardent aspirations 
after the closest attainable resemblance to that 
character, in conformity to which the very es- 
sence of meetness for heaven consists ; and 
subordinating every other solicitude to that one, 
which ought ever to be the master-passion of a 
Christian's soul — even the affectionate solicitude, 
prompted by gratitude, to glorify his Saviour- 
God. 

Nor should it be overlooked, that the attrac- 
tive exhibition of the Saviour's character, and 
love to His people, which this work unfolds, has a 
powerful tendency to deepen in their hearts, that 
desire for the day of His appearing, which is exhi- 
bited in Scripture as such a distinguishing charac- 
teristic of those who love the Lord, and is calculat- 
ed when invested with divine energy by the power 
of the Holy Spirit, to exercise such an elevating, 
sanctifying, and gladdening influence over their 
souls. For, in proportion as love to a Saviour- 
God, springing from the adoring contemplation of 
His character, and the grateful recollection of 
His love, reigns with more supreme sovereignty 
in a believer's heart, will his soul be kept in that 
attitude, which will so pre-eminently conduce to 
its progress in holiness and happiness, even habit- 
ually looking and longing for the arrival of that 
day, a day of such terror to all His enemies, but 
such triumph to all his friends, when Christ, who 
is His people's life, shall appear, and they shall 
also appear with Him in glory. 



INTRODUCTORY ESSAY. 45 

Oh ! what blessed results would follow to the 
Christian, from the constantly cherished anticipa- 
tion of that glorious day, producing the desire and 
endeavour, in the strength of divine grace, to be 
always in that frame of mind, and that occupa- 
tion of time, in which a faithful servant of God 
would wish to be found, were he to be surprised by 
the sudden appearing of the Son of Man, coming- 
in the clouds of heaven, with power and great 
glory, and we know not now the day or the hour 
when the Son of Man will come ! What a spirit 
of unslumbering watchfulness would it promote ! 
What a shrinking from the deliberate indulgence 
of any thoughts, desires, or tempers, inconsistent 
with the character of a child of God ! What a 
stamp of holiness unto the Lord would it impress 
on every inward principle and affection of the 
heart, and every outward pursuit and action of 
the life ! What a savour of sanctity would it 
impart to the conversation of the children of God, 
and what a fervour of zeal to be faithful and dili- 
gent in the consecration of all their talents to the 
advancement of a beloved Saviour's glory ! How 
calm would it keep them in the midst of surround 
ing commotions ! How cheerful in the midst of 
the most afflictive dispensations ! How would the 
things of time sink to their proper level of com- 
parative insignificance, and loosen their hold on 
the believer's heart, and the things of eternity 
rise to their proper place in his estimation, and 
engross, as they ought to do, his supreme solici- 
tude ! What an elevation, what a grandeur, al 



16 INTRODUCTORY ESSAY. 

together unearthly, would it fling round the Chris- 
tian s character, were he to feel and to exhibit the 
legitimate influences of the blessed hope, which 
he is privileged to cherish, even that at the glori- 
ous appearing of the great God, our Saviour, he 
shall be a partaker of His glory, and shall sit 
down with Him on His throne ! Oh ! what 
earthly seductions could ensnare, what earthly 
sorrows overwhelm the soul, in which such a hope 
habitually opened vista views of the glory to be 
revealed ! Would not such a hope, through the 
power of God, the Holy Ghost, enable its posses- 
sor to trample on the temptations of the world, 
the flesh, and the devil, and to purify himself, even 
as that Saviour-God on which it is fixed is pure ! 
If then holiness, as we have before observed, 
be but another name for happiness ; if a meetness 
for heaven, imparted by the Saviour's Spirit, be 
altogether as indispensable as a title to heaven, 
resting on the Saviour's righteousness, how valu- 
able must be every work, which, by deepening in 
a Christian's heart, his love to the God of his 
salvation, proportion ably deepens that desire for 
the day of His appearing, which tends so power- 
fully to wean him from an undue attachment to 
the things of time and sense, and to elevate his 
affections to those things that are above, where 
Christ sitteth at the right hand of the Father, to 
conform him to the image of his beloved Redeem- 
er, and thus to advance his meetness for " the in- 
heritance among the saints in light, incorruptible, 
and underlie d, and that fadeth not away." 



INTRODUCTORY ESSAY. 47 

It was this persuasion, which constrained me to 
overcome the reluctance, which at first I felt, to 
comply with the request of the highly esteemed 
minister who has translated the work, that I would 
accompany the translation with some prefatory 
observations, It appeared to me so impossible to 
read it with any thing of a suitable spirit without 
an increase of love to the Saviour, accompanied 
by all its precious fruits, that, even at the risk of 
appearing presumptuous, I could not refuse a re- 
quest, which afforded me an opportunity of bear- 
ing my humble testimony in favour of a work, so 
pre-eminently calculated to promote the Saviour's 
glory. Not that I imagine that such a work at 
all needed my humble recommendation, (for I 
feel convinced its intrinsic merits must render it 
altogether independent of any testimony, on its 
behalf, beyond what it bears to itself,) but because 
I felt a cordial satisfaction in expressing, through 
this medium, my grateful acknowledgements for 
the rich feast of enjoyment with which the perusal 
of this work had supplied me, especially in the 
endearing views which it unfolds of the loveliness 
of the Saviour's character, and the graciousness 
of His design, in the chastening afflictions with 
which He visits His people. 

I would observe, before I conclude, that the 
translation, as far as I am competent to judge, 
appears to me to be every way worthy of such a 
work, being executed with great fidelity, and yet 
sufficient freedom not to allow the spirit of the 
original to evaporate, in the process of transfusing 



48 INTRODUCTORY ESSAY. 

it into an English version. From the peculiar 
animation of style in which the original is written, 
and which, it might have been feared, would be 
altogether untransferable, this was no easy task: 
out the translation here given satisfactorily proves, 
that the difficulties, however great, were not in- 
superable. It is quite free from all the awkward- 
ness and stiffness, which so often characterize the 
translation, especially of French works, and wears 
so fully the air of an original production, that you 
feel convinced, had the author of the work him- 
self written in English, it would have worn the 
very garb in which it is now presented to the 
Dublic. 

In conclusion, I would express my most fervent 
prayer, that the Divine blessing may so abun- 
dantly accompany this work in its progress, as to 
make it the minister of consolation to many a 
mourner in Zion, pouring the healing balm of di- 
vine comfort into many a wounded heart, teach- 
ing them more fully to understand the loving- 
kindness of the Lord, in all the trials with which, 
in very faithfulness, He afflicts them ; and to 
honour Him, both in their own hearts, and in the 
eyes of all around, with the most undoubting con- 
fidingness, and the most cheerful submission, 
amidst the most painful or perplexing dispensa- 
tions He may see fit to appoint. 

May it stir up every child of God, into whose 
hands it may come, to be fervent and unwearied 
in prayer for the promised influences of the Holy 
Spirit, to enable them, while resting their undi 



INTRODUCTORY ESSAY. 49 

vided hopes of acceptance on the Redeemer's in- 
finitely meritorious, and alone justifying righteous- 
ness, to copy more closely that Divine character, 
whose celestial beauty is in this volume so attrac- 
tively unveiled, and to abound more fully in every 
work and labour of love, by which His kingdom 
may be extended, and His glory advanced ! And 
may it also be a preacher of glad tidings to those, 
who are strangers to the love of Jesus, persuading 
many a child of affliction, whom it finds ignorant 
of the only true and effectual Comforter, and wan- 
dering to and fro in a vain search for rest, amidst 
the restless agitations of a world, deluged with 
floods of sin and sorrow, to flee to the only true 
ark of divine peace and consolation — the shelter- 
ing ark of a Redeemer's love — encouraged by 
those most endearing words, the tenderest, per- 
haps, that ever were uttered, even by the lips of 
incarnate love itself — " Come unto Me, all ye that 
are weary and heavy laden, and I will give you 
rest." Oh ! if those blessed words were but wel- 
comed, as they ought to be, by every child of sor- 
row, to whom they are made known — if all that 
are weary and heavy laden would but accept this 
most gracious invitation, and come, and cast down 
the burthen of their sins and sorrows at the foot 
of this compassionate and Almighty Redeemer's 
cross, and take the light yoke of His love and ser- 
vice upon them, and thus find rest unto their souls, 
what a glorious change would soon pass over our 
wilderness-world ! Then, indeed, might we hope 
.hat the Holy Spirit (who can alone, by the om* 

5 



50 INTRODUCTORY ESSAY. 

nipotent operation of His grace, enable the sinnei 
to accept the invitation of a Saviour- God, and 
come to Him for rest, and whose enlightening and 
sanctifying influences should therefore be most 
fervently implored by all to whom that invitation 
is addressed) would be abundantly poured forth 
from above, and filling, by His divine presence 
and power, every heart with the peace of God, 
and that joy which is unspeakable and full of 
glory, breathe all around an atmosphere of such 
holy love, and holy happiness, that earth would 
be changed, by His celestial influences, into a fore- 
tasted heaven. 

Oh, then, that all, to whom these words of divine 
compassion are addressed, would seek, in humble, 
earnest prayer, the enlightening, constraining, 
and sanctifying influences of that Spirit, who can 
alone, by His Almighty power, persuade the 
heart of the sinner thankfully to embrace this in- 
vitation, in which the very essence of a Redeem- 
er's love seems to be concentrated. Oh! that 
they would ask that Father of all mercies, (who 
has so graciously promised to give the Holy Spirit 
to them that ask Him,) that He would send this 
blessed Spirit into their hearts, to overcome their 
natural enmity against Himself, and to draw them 
to Him who so tenderly invites them, by the 
sweetly irresistible attraction of redeeming love, 
to prostrate themselves in penitential sorrow, and 
adoring gratitude, at this infinitely precious Sa- 
viour's feet, to give up their hearts undividedly to 
Him, that he may reign there in rightful supre* 






INTRODUCTORY ESSAY. 51 

macy, and to surrender up themselves unreservedly 
to Him, to have their sins blotted out in His blood 
— their souls clothed in His righteousness, and 
sanctified by His grace — and their sorrows soothed 
by His sympathy and His consolations. Oh! 
were all the sons and daughters of affliction thus 
fervent in their supplications for the influences of 
that Spirit, whose prerogative it is to glorify Jesus ? 
and who alone can enlighten the darkened under- 
standing, soften the hard heart, bend the stubborn 
will, purify the polluted soul, and constrain the 
before careless despisers of His grace gratefully to 
listen to the voice of a Saviour-God, beseeching 
them to come to Him for that deliverance from 
eternal wrath and woe — for that rest and that sal- 
vation which He has purchased for His people 
with His own most precious blood, — then, indeed, 
might we hope soon to see a glorious change pass 
over the now desolated aspect of this vale of tears ; 
for then, in answer to the prayers of humble and 
contrite hearts, this blessed Spirit would abun- 
dantly pour down the refreshing showers of His 
grace, by whose fertilizing influence the waste 
and solitary places of this earth would become as 
the garden of the Lord, and its wilderness would 
rejoice and blossom as the rose ; joy and gladness 
would be found therein, thanksgiving, and the 
voice of melody. Oh ! were this glorious change 
wrought upon earth — were a Saviour's love en- 
throned in every heart — a Saviour's image stamped 
on every spirit — His peace reigning in every soul 
•—and his praise thrilling on every tongue, — while 



52 INTRODUCTORY ESSAY. 

all who named the name of Christ, loving each 
other in Him, and linked together in the bonds of 
christian fellowship, like the members of the holy 
and happy family of Bethany, would form but one 
great family of love. Oh ! would not earth be 
then indeed a very type and antepast of heaven ? 
— that glorious world of unclouded light and ever- 
lasting love, where, in the presence of a Saviour- 
God, there is fulness of joy, and at His right hand 
pleasures for evermore ; where all its inhabitants 
supremely love, and are like Him, for they see 
Him as He is ; and where, from a multitude 
which no man could number, of all nations, and 
kindred, and people, and tongues, casting their 
blood-bought crowns in grateful adoration at his 
feet, there shall be lifted up unceasingly through 
everlasting ages, before His throne, the song of 
praise — " Unto Him that hath loved us, and 
washed us from our sins in His own blood, and 
hath made us kings and priests unto God, even 
his Father," — unto Him, with the Everlasting 
Father, and Holy Spirit, be equal and undivided 
adoration, and praise, and glory, and blessing foi 
ever, and ever ! Amen, and amen ! 



THE 

FAMILY OF BETHANY 



MEDITATION I. 

LAZARUS, MARY, AND MARTHA. 



John xi. 1. 



* Now a certain man was sick, named Lazarus, of Bethany, the town 
of Mary and her sister Martha." 

" Admirable ! The christian religion, which 
seems only to have for its object the felicity of 
another life, secures also our happiness in this." 

This truth, which thus excited the admiration 
of a great man,* is too little known by the people 
of the world, and too little appreciated even by 
those who enjoy the privilege of experiencing it. 

Doubtless, creatures of a day, '• strangers and 
pilgrims," do well not to calculate upon happiness 
in a world defiled by sin. This is not the place 
of our rest; to seek repose here would be a mere 
delusion. And it is not for us, the ministers of 
Him who while He was on earth had not where 
to lay His head, to encourage in those whom we 
address on His part, the natural desire which we 

* Montesquieu. 

5* 



54 MEDITATION I. 

all feel, to enjoy before the time, to rest before we 
have finished the race, to reap before we have 
sown. But it is a great error, and one into which 
many fall, who know the Gospel only in name, to 
imagine, that in submitting our heart unreservedly 
to Christ, we are required to make sacrifices with- 
out compensation, and to impose upon ourselves 
acts of self-denial without enjoyment. The Gos- 
pel, far from wishing to stifle our noblest feelings, 
or to paralyze our most exalted faculties, elevates 
and sanctifies them, by restoring them to their 
original destination, from which they have been 
diverted by sin. That Gospel, rightly understood, 
is found to meet all the wants of our mind and of 
our heart, and thus practically evinces the truth 
of the declaration of an inspired Apostle, that 
n Godliness hath the promise of the life which now 
is, and of that which is to come." The whole life 
of the Redeemer proves this truth. Though the 
immediate object of His mission was, " to seek and 
to save that which was lost," yet was there not 
one of our temporal afflictions the sight of which 
did not touch a chord of sympathy in His heart ; 
not one of our bodily pains which He did not has- 
ten to mitigate ; not one of our misfortunes or suf- 
ferings for which He did not, in the ardour of His 
love, find some alleviation. 

Shall we, then, the ministers of His word, while 
we desire to declare the whole counsel of God, 
pass over in silence, in our private or public min- 
istrations, this part of our Master's Divine mis- 
sion ? No, we cannot, we must not do it. My 



LAZARUS, MARY, AND MARTHA. 55 

beloved brethren, it is our duty to exhibit to you 
His whole work, His whole life. And if in speak- 
ing to you of Jesus Christ, who ought to be our 
principal theme, and as it were the text of all our 
instructions, we are called upon most frequently 
to represent Him to you as coming down from 
heaven to heal the moral malady which preys 
upon our soul, as dying for our sins and rising 
again for our justification, shall we on that ac- 
count neglect to bring before you that touching 
part of His life on earth which was employed in 
alleviating our temporal miseries, and in consoling 
all the afflicted who applied to Him for relief? 
No, we repeat it once more, we cannot, we must 
not do it. Besides, my brethren, to show you 
Christ the Comforter, is to show you Christ the 
Saviour ; for He comforts only by saving ; He 
saves from the bitter consequences of sin only by 
destroying the cause of them— sin. 

We know not, in the whole Gospel history, a 
passage more affecting, more instructive, or more 
calculated to exhibit all the love and tenderness 
of Jesus for the miserable beings whom He came 
to save, than that which contains an account of 
the life, death, and resurrection of one of His dis- 
ciples, as we find it recorded in the chapter from 
which our text is taken. 

You that have a heart capable of feeling al! 
that is grand, and noble, and divine, in a love like 
that of Jesus; you who have been taught in the 
school of affliction, or are still groaning under some 
heavy trial ; you will be glad to come and medi- 



56 MEDITATION I. 

tate with me over the tomb of Lazarus, the friend 
of Jesus. You will rejoice even in that gloomy 
abode of death, when Jesus is there to diffuse light 
and life. You will look without pain upon the 
afflictions of the family of Bethany, when Jesus is 
there to comfort. You will rejoice even amid the 
miseries of our earthly life, when Jesus is present 
to supply for them a remedy. Sometimes, per- 
haps, after having wept with Mary and Martha 
over the tomb of some well-beloved brother, your 
tears, like theirs, will be turned into this song of 
triumph : " O death, where is thy sting; O grave } 
where is thy victory ! I" Through the course of 
your life, you will find, perhaps, too many occa- 
sions to apply to yourselves the lessons which the 
two afflicted sisters here receive. Which of you 
has been exempt from the calamities, the suffer- 
ings, and the sorrows, inseparable from our earthly 
pilgrimage ; or which of you, at least, can calcu- 
late on being long exempted from them? Alas! 
to address the afflicted is to address all mankind ' 
It is therefore for your own sakes that we wish to 
make you acquainted with Jesus Christ, the only 
real Comforter. 

My beloved brethren, we entreat you, first of 
all, to unite with us in supplicating a blessing 
from above upon the meditations which we are 
going to commence this day, that what we speak 
may not be the miserable words of a sinful mor- 
tal, but the words of eternal life, accompanied by 
the demonstration of the Spirit and of power. 

He that speaks in the passage we are about to 



LAZARUS, MARY, AND MARTHA. 57 

consider is St. John; St. John, the disciple whom 
Jesus loved ; St. John, who, at the last supper, 
leaned upon the breast of his Master, or, rather, 
his Friend, and who seems to have drawn thence, 
in such copious draughts, the love of his redeem- 
ing God ; St. John, who, at the foot of the cross, 
received the most precious of bequests, that of the 
mother of the dying Jesus. That disciple seems 
to have considered the whole Gospel as comprised 
in one word — -love. It is from this love that he 
derives everything ; to this love he refers every- 
thing. " He that loveth not, knoweth not God, 
for God is love. God is love, and he that loveth 
abideth in Him. Behold, what manner of love 
the Father hath bestowed upon us 5 that we should 
be called the sons of God ! God so loved the 
world that He gave his only-begotten Son, that 
whosoever believeth m Him, should not perish, 
but have everlasting life ! !" Such is the lan- 
guage of this disciple, such the constant thought 
of his heart. Jesus, Jesus alone, is more than the 
whole universe to him ; Jesus is the soul of his 
soul. And hence we shall see that this disciple, 
who lived in the most intimate union with his 
Saviour, and who in consequence always under- 
stood so well His sentiments, is ever struck with 
what is most tender and most deeply touching in 
the words and actions of Jesus. Every page of 
his writings affords a demonstration of this. In 
the very history which we propose to make the 
subject of our meditations we see the invincible 



58 MEDITATION I. 

desire which he felt to lead us to the tomb of 
Lazarus, and to show us the Saviour mingling 
His tears of compassion with the tears of Martha 
and Mary, and restoring peace and joy to those 
hearts, torn with anguish. For this purpose he 
interrupts the course of his narrative, and intro- 
duces this affecting episode, before he presents to 
us the last sufferings of his beloved Master. And 
what an introduction to the sufferings of Jesus is 
this history, which so beautifully exemplifies His 
love for those whom He came to save ? St. John 
relates the resurrection of Lazarus as an eye-wit- 
ness ; yea more, he relates it as one who, with all 
the strength of a feeling and loving heart, sympa- 
thized in the afflictions of a family with which he 
was acquainted, and which he loved because they 
loved his Master. Therefore it is that we find 
him entering into the minutest details, in which 
we cannot but follow him with interest. He in- 
troduces us, without preliminary, into the peaceful 
abode of Bethany : " A certain man was sick, 
named Lazarus, of Bethany, the town of Mary 
and her sister Martha. It was that Mary which 
anointed the Lord with ointment, and wiped 
His feet with her hair, whose brother Lazarus 
was sick." 

Bethany was a little village pleasantly situated 
on the eastern side of the Mount of Olives, and 
about two miles distant from Jerusalem. There 
Jesus had friends whose hearts as well as theii 
house were ever open to receive Him: there He 
frequently repaired to spend the night with His 



LAZARUS, MARY, AND MARTHA. 59 

disciples : there He was wont to forget, amid the 
communications of friendship and confidence, the 
fatigue of His journeys, and the grief which was 
continually excited in His breast, by the ingrati- 
tude and impenitence of those whom He came 
to save. 

It was a feast for Lazarus and his two sister* 
whenever Jesus honoured their humble dwelling 
with His presence. They belonged in heart to 
that small number of true Israelites, who expected, 
in the Messiah, " the consolation of Israel." What 
must have been their joy, when they were given 
to recognize and love, in Jesus, that Saviour after 
whom their soul longed " as the hart panteth for 
the water-brooks!" What must have been their 
delight, when they saw that Jesus loved them ; 
that He often came into the bosom of their happy 
abode, to speak to them of the kingdom of peace 
and love I 

O my beloved brethren ! you who know by 
your own experience the sweetness of that bro- 
therly love which the Saviour allows His children 
to taste on earth as a refreshment : — you who 
have learned from the Gospel to feel and to love ; 
— you will understand something of the happiness 
which Lazarus and his two sisters must have ex- 
perienced in their peaceful and affectionate con- 
versations with Jesus, who loved them, opened 
His heart to them, and had admitted them into 
the sweet bonds of a holy friendship. If you now 
derive so much happiness from the society of those 
whom you love in the Lord, what must have been 



60 MEDITATION I. 

the ineffable feeling of peace and of blessedness 
which Jesus ever left in the abode of Bethany, 
and in the hearts of those who dwelt there ? We 
see, also, that Lazarus and his sisters loved Jesus 
above all things. They felt themselves honoured 
by His affection, notwithstanding the reproach of 
the Nazarene, and the persecutions which the 
hatred of the rulers of the people had already 
raised against Jesus, and all those who professed 
themselves His disciples. And when the multi- 
tude, excited by the scribes and pharisees, "took 
up stones to stone Him," Lazarus and his sisters 
were happy to afford an asylum to Him who, 
though He had created worlds, had not where to 
lay His head. We have reason to believe that 
Jesus frequently retired to Bethany up to the last 
moment of His sufferings, to that moment when 
He laid down His life a ransom for sinners. O 
my Saviour ! would that I could thus testify my 
love to Thee ! My dear brethren, are your houses 
a refuge for the Saviour's name, blasphemed in 
the world ? Do you confess Him with love and 
without fear, in the midst of an unbelieving gene- 
ration? Is His name known, pronounced with 
reverence, and invoked in your families? Are 
your houses Bethanies, when Jerusalem — the 
world — prepares to crucify, as far as in it lies, 
" the Lord of glory ?" Do they who are still 
strangers to the love of Christ find in your abodes 
"an altar of witness" erected to His glory? 
Breathes there in your dwellings the peace of 
the Saviour's presence ? Is the light of His truth 



LAZARUS, MARY, AND MARTHA. 61 

seen to shine there ? 0, if it be so, my beloved 
friends, you shall find Jesus, in the day of trial, 
what Martha and Mary found Him in the hour 
of affliction. 

What a sweet union must have existed between 
Lazarus and his two sisters, notwithstanding the 
difference of their characters ! The love of Jesus 
was the solid bond which united them ; and where 
there is that bond there is happiness. Doubtless 
they lived retired from a world which has ever 
been at enmity with God. Jesus and His disci- 
ples, and a few faithful Israelites, were perhaps 
the only friends who came from time to time to 
interrupt, agreeably, the silence and the solitude 
j)f Bethany. Jesus, St. John tells us, loved Laza- 
rus. He found in him one of those, so rare in the 
world, who, when they have received and under- 
stood His word, are able to open their hearts to 
the noble and pure impressions of a holy affec- 
tion. That friend of Jesus, even in his obscure 
retreat, was greater in the eyes of the Saviour, 
than the heroes of the world whose names are 
emblazoned in the annals of time. Lazarus mus* 
still have been in the vigour of life, if at least we 
give credit to tradition, which informs us that he 
lived thirty years after his resurrection. It may 
then be asked, how it happened that Jesus did 
not call him to follow Him in the ministry of the 
apostle ship ; how He left His friend in his solitary 
retreat at Bethany, while He called Peter to for- 
sake his fishing-boat and nets, and Matthew the 
receipt of custom, that they might become mes- 

6 



62 MEDITATION I. 

sengers of the Gospel of peace % There were 
doubtless good reasons for this conduct of the 
Saviour : He knows the situation which is best 
suited to each of those whom He loves, and He 
calls them to it. His wisdom and goodness 
were not questioned by Lazarus : whether or not 
he understood the grounds of his Master's deal- 
ings with him, he submitted to them cheerfully. 
u What does it matter," thought he, " in what 
manner He calls me to bear witness to His love ? 
Should He require of me no other service than 
that of offering Him from time to time an hum- 
ble hospitality, I submit. Yea, should He even 
call me to honour Him in no other way than by 
suffering, to glorify Him in no other way than on 
a bed of pain, I know that He does not on that 
account love me less than those who perhaps 
may be employed to bear testimony to His name 
and to His truth before governors and kings." 
Are these your sentiments, you who are called to 
works of charity and devotedness unseen of men? 
Were you called to give but a cup of cold water 
in His name, to share your bread with some mise- 
rable object whom He presents before you, or to 
say a few words of consolation to an afflicted soul 
unknown to the world, would you deem yourselves 
as highly honoured by Him as those whose name 
the world publishes in letters of gold, and whom 
it proclaims as the benefactors of mankind 1 Or 
if the Lord should call you to serve Him by " the 
work of patience," in some great affliction, or upon 
a bed of pain, would you deem yourselves as 



LAZARUS, MARY, AND MARTHA. 63 

highly honoured as those whom He summons ta 
proclaim His Name and His Gospel from the 
pulpit and before brilliant assemblies ? Ah ! re- 
member that God looks to the heart ; He regards 
not that which man regards. How many ser- 
vants of Christ, unknown by the world, pass un- 
perceived through the desert of life, and shall be 
manifested only when He who searches the heart 
shall place on their heads, in the presence of men 
and angels, an incorruptible crown of glory ! 

Martha, who was probably the elder of the two 
sisters of Lazarus, had, if we may judge from 
some circumstances related in the Gospel, a cha- 
racter entirely different from that of her brother 
and sister. She was the St. Peter of her sex. In 
her, thought, feeling, and action, were all blended 
in one and the same rapid movement. Every 
time an opportunity occurs of testifying her affec- 
tion to Jesus, ~,*"3 find her active, restless, and anx- 
ious, seeking every possible means of receiving in 
a suitable manner a guest so worthy of her vene- 
ration and love. As soon as Jesus arrives, all 
must be on the alert in the house ; every thing 
must be put into requisition for His reception. 
She could not understand how any one could for 
a moment neglect serving Him, to sit at His feet, 
to listen to His instruction, and make Him speak, 
and thus weary Him before He was rested and 
refreshed, and before there had been offered to 
Him a repast of the best things which the house 
afforded. Still she was far from understanding 
the thoughts and desires of Jesus: but she was 



64 MEDITATION I. 

sincere and upright in her manner of testifying 
her attachment to Him. Hence St. John associ* 
ates her with the other members of the family 
whom Jesus loved ; and our Lord himself deems 
it sufficient to give her an affectionate rebuke, 
saying to her with meekness, u Martha, Martha, 
thou art careful and troubled about many things : 
but one thing is needful ; and Mary hath chosen 
that good part, which shall not.be taken away 
from her." Luke x. 41, 42. 

Mary, however, felt and acted quite differently. 
She was the St. John of her sex. All her lively 
feelings were engraven deeply in the very ground 
of her tender soul. She felt that her Saviour 
alone could satisfy the boundless wants of her af- 
fectionate heart. When she saw 7 and heard Him, 
she lost sight of every thing else ; the world dis- 
appeared from her view. It was her happiness 
to sit at His feet, and to treasure up with avidity 
in her heart every word that proceeded from His 
divine lips. The Saviour's visits to Bethany were 
always too distant and too short to meet her wish- 
es ; the hours of His presence passed away too 
rapidly. Mary could not bear to lose one moment 
of them. Like Martha, she would have wished 
to offer Him all that was most precious to her, all 
that she possessed ; but she knew that Jesus came 
to give rather than to receive, and that He who 
had despised " all the kingdoms of this world, and 
the glory of them," demanded but one thing of His 
disciples — their heart. She deemed herself inca- 
pable of offering Him any thing which was wor- 



LAZARUS, MARY, AND MARTHA. 65 

thy of Him — or even of testifying by words her 
deep veneration and love Her attentive look, a 
few tears which escaped from her eyes while she 
listened to Him who " spake as never man spake," 
were the only expressions which she gave of what 
she felt. Oh ! how precious to her were those 
hours, when she listened to her Saviour speaking 
to her of the great salvation which He had come 
to accomplish for His redeemed, of the pardon of 
their heavenly Father, their reconciliation to Hirn, 
the peace which He gives them, His love, and of 
that better country where there shall be no more 
sorrow, because there shall be no more sin ! 

However, it would be wrong to suppose that 
Mary made all her spiritual life, all her love for the 
Saviour, all her religion, consist in idle contempla- 
tion, in a barren quietism. In one of the last visits 
which Jesus made to Bethany, " six days before 
the passover," writes St. John, that is, a few days 
before the Saviour's death, there was a supper at 
the house of Lazarus, who had been raised from 
the dead, at which Jesus was present with Hi? 
disciples. 

Martha, according to her custom, was occu 
pied in serving Jesus, whilst Mary, always full 
of the thoughts of her Saviour, took a box of 
ointment, very costly, and anointed His feet, 
and wiped them with her hair. She was blamed 
for so doing by Judas, who pretended that he 
would have preferred giving the price of it to the 
poor. But Jesus said, " Let her alone : against 
the day of my burying hath she kept this. For 



66 MEDITATION L 

the poor always ye have with you, but me ye 
have not always." Was not this saying, with 
sufficient plainness, that she whose heart was so 
penetrated with the love of her Saviour, would 
find in that love the source of all good works ? 
Ah ! this is the principle of all christian life, of 
every good work, of all sanctiflcation, — love 
springing from a renewed heart, love for Him 
who so loved us as to save us, love without which 
all religion is a mere name, a barren tree which 
can bear no fruit, a steril soil which can produce 
nothing. " He who loveth not hath not known 
God." It is in vain, then, that we pretend to be 
Christ's disciples because we bear His name, 
because we do some good, because we take even 
an active interest in the advancement of His 
kingdom, or because, like Martha, we are " cum- 
bered about many things," if we have not in our 
hearts that love which leads us to seek commu- 
nion with God in prayer, and makes us, like 
Mary, love His Word : that love which changes 
our heart, and makes us new creatures : that 
love which 'alone eradicates selfishness, and makes 
us renounce ourselves : that love which never 
faileth, which shall subsist when all things else 
shall have passed away ; which shall be the ele- 
ment of eternal felicity. If we have not that 
love, in vain shall we " speak with the tongues 
of men and angels," in vain shall we have " the 
gift of prophecy," in vain shall we "know all 
mysteries," in vain shall we " bestow all our 
goods to feed the poor," in vain shall we " give 



LAZARUS, MARY, AND MARTHA. 67 

our bodies to be burned." Without love (it is 
the Word of God that declares it) all this will 
profit us nothing : we shall be as " sounding brass 
and as a tinkling cymbal" All this will stand us 
in no stead in the great day of Christ, when 
every thing shall come to an end but love. 

Oh! my beloved friends, whatever be our 
name or our profession, let us take occasion, from 
the example of Mary, to ask ourselves seriously 5 
before God, of what kind is our religion — what is 
it that constitutes the life of our souls, the subject 
of our hopes, the motive of our actions 1 If we 
love the Saviour, if we have a faith in Him which 
works by love, if our heart be given up to Him, 
all is well. If we feel but a cold indifference 
towards Him, all is ill, eternally ill. 

Such was the happy family of Bethany. All 
the members of that family were loved by Jesus. 
All loved Him, and consequently all loved each 
other. The love of Jesus is a sweet bond of 
affection. In that close union all is necessarily 
common, pleasures and pains, joys and griefs, 
hopes and fears. That family, perhaps for a long 
time, had lived peaceably in the happy feeling of 
the love of Jesus. But, alas ! they lived in a 
world of misery ; they had, therefore, to expect 
suffering. A dark cloud suddenly arises to ob- 
scure their horizon, and portends a dreadful storm. 
But the members of that family had already sub- 
mitted their hearts to the love of Jesus ; they 
will therefore be able to " bear one another's 
burdens ;" they will also know, that it is in the 



68 MEDITATION I. 

hour of trial that the Lord multiplies the pledges 
of His love and of His grace. What will they 
have to fear ? Jesus is their friend ! 

Fathers and mothers of families, brothers and 
sisters, you whom God has united on earth by the 
most powerful ties, you whom He has called to 
perform in company your earthly pilgrimage, do 
you find nothing in the humble abode of Bethany 
which demands your imitation, and is worthy of 
your ambition ? Do you know by experience 
that christian affection, which in the hand of God 
so powerfully contributes to sweeten all that is 
most bitter in life % Is it in Jesus that you love 
one another? Is the love of Jesus the sacred 
and indissoluble bond which unites your souls for 
eternity ? Does His peace reign in your families 
as it did in the family of Bethany ? If it be so, 
we doubt not that you will find pleasure and 
edification in tracing with us the mournful experi- 
ences, as well as the consolations and joys, of 
Lazarus and his sisters. You will learn from 
them how the friends of Jesus conduct themselves 
in the hour of trial. May you also learn from 
them to give Him your heart ! 



MEDITATION II. 

LAZARUS SICK.— THE GLORY OF GOD. 



John xi. 3, 4. 

' Therefore his sisters sent unto Him, saying, Lord, behold, he 
whom Thou lovest is sick. When Jesus heard that, He said. This 
sickness is not unto death, but for the glory of God, that the Son 
of God might be glorified thereby." 

The present state of mankind would be an in- 
comprehensible enigma, had not revelation given 
us an explanation of it in those few words, " By one 
man sin entered into the world, and death by sin; 
and so death passed upon all men, for that all have 
sinned." Such is the history of the fallen race of 
Adam. Here we have the solution of that inex- 
plicable problem, which meets us in all ages, and 
in all climes. If I open the annals of those ages, 
which have been swallowed up in the past, what 
do I see ? An uninterrupted succession of beings, 
who appear for a moment upon this stage, which 
we call life, announce their birth by cries of grief, 
and terminate their career by agonies and death. 
There is the cradle bedewed with tears, and soon 
after the tomb — mournful abode of dissolution! 
And between these two acts of grief, what fills up 



70 MEDITATION II. 

the scenes of this melancholy drama? Alas! to 
know it we need not go and consult the pages of 
man's, history, we have only to look around us, to 
see and to hear. Scarcely a few rays of light, es- 
caping as it were by chance, spread here and 
there a pale brightness over the sombre picture 
which is unfolded to our view. Every where our 
eyes are arrested by the sight of suffering creatures, 
the prey of a thousand miseries, a thousand 
agonies, a thousand griefs. Every echo repeats 
the lamentation of afflicted man, the cry of pain 
extorted from him by a universal malady which 
consumes him. Volumes would not suffice to enu- 
merate the names and the symptoms of all the 
diseases which seem to conspire to throw bitter- 
ness on days so short — which appear to contend 
for the dreadful privilege of dragging man to the 
grave, and of mingling him with the dust of the 
tomb. And as if all these miseries were not 
enough, man seems to have imposed upon himself 
the task of multiplying their number by his wick- 
edness, his cruelty, and his crimes. In vain would 
we turn our eyes from this melancholy spectacle, 
and persuade ourselves that it does not exist ; in 
vain would we, advocates of an absurd optimism, 
wish to see light where there is darkness ; sweet 
where there is bitterness; good where there is 
evil. In vain would we, armed with a Stoical in- 
sensibility, desire to raise a rampart between us 
and the misery which surrounds us. We become the 
prey of it ourselves, and though, perhaps, we have 
refused to acknowledge that u all flesh is as grass, 



LAZARUS SICK. 71 

and all the glory of man as the flower of grass,'* 
which springs up, is cut down, and withers in a 
day, we fall ourselves, and, alas! our fall is the 
only argument which convinces us of the vanity 
of our being. Well would it be for us, if we w r ere 
ready humbly to acknowledge the evil, to study the 
cause of it, and to apply to it a speedy remedy! 
But oh ! infatuation ! We walk upon graves, and 
we forget Death, Judgment, and Eternity ! We 
scarcely can take a few steps in the streets of this 
vast city, without meeting some of those gloomy 
processions which accompany our fellow-men to 
their last home ; and we forget that soon our so- 
ciety, however brilliant, or however dear to us, 
shall be converted into a similar procession for 
ourselves. 

But no, some one of our companions in misery 
will say, No, I do not practise such a delusion 
upon myself; I feel too deeply the afflictions of 
this miserable life — I am overwhelmed by them ; 
but what must I do ? 

My brother, come, let us enter an afflicted 
christian family. Perhaps you will find there an 
answer to your question : perhaps (oh ! may the 
Lord grant it), perhaps having complained of the 
evil, you will rejoice to have found the source of 
the remedy. It is to the sick bed of a suffering 
fellow-creature that I am going to lead you. 
Approach without fear, and may you receive in- 
struction. 

In a preceding meditation we have become 
acquainted with the family of Bethany, who lived 



72 MEDITATION II. 

in peace, happy in the distinguished affection with 
which Jesus honoured them. We now proceed 
to follow our Evangelist. Lazarus is seized with 
a dangerous malady : this is all that St. John tells 
us. Gifted with an affectionate and compassion- 
ate heart, he judges it necessary to say no more: 
he thinks we shall he able to picture to ourselves 
this family, united as they were in the strictest 
bonds, struck with such a painful blow; he feels 
assured that we shall participate in the anxiety of 
Martha ; in the grief of Mary. 

Lazarus is sick ; he suffers. What ! he who is 
a beloved disciple of Jesus; he whom Jesus calls 
His friend; he who loves the Lord is not, then, 
more exempt than other men from the miseries 
of life, from pain, and from sickness. 

There are, perhaps, two classes of persons who 
will make such reflections as these, and will find 
here a " stone of stumbling" for their faith. The 
one, like those selfish disciples, who followed Je- 
sus not because they believed in Him, nor because 
they loved Him, but because He had increased 
the loaves ; who seek in the Gospel nothing but 
earthly advantages and consolations, a temporal 
remedy for inevitable evils, food for their sensi- 
bility, a selfish enjoyment in the attractions which 
the religion of Jesus offers them. Such persons 
would consent to live for the world and for their 
passions, so long as they found themselves happy 
in that kind of life, and they regard what they call 
the " consolations of religion," merely as a der- 
nier resort in case of misfortune, or as those insu- 



LAZARUS SICK. 73 

ranees against fire which a man purchases before- 
hand, and to which he scarcely ever gives a pass- 
ing thought, except when his house is burned. 
Any sacrifice which crucifies the flesh is too much 
for them. All those trials by which God would 
disengage them from the world, and sanctify them 
for His kingdom, are excluded from their calcula- 
tions and from their religion, and consequently do 
not find their hearts submissive. Infatuated mor- 
tals ! what do you expect from following Jesus ? 
Do you imagine that coming to Him in this way, 
as a last resource, without giving Him your heart, 
you shall be delivered from your earthly miseries 
as by a miracle % Do you imagine that He will 
multiply your bread, and that He will render you 
inaccessible to poverty, sickness, pain, and death? 
Ah! be not deceived : you see Lazarus, the friend 
of Jesus, sick and suffering. From his bed of pain, 
learn to understand better the nature of the Gos- 
pel, and what you ought to look for in it. If you 
have not been taught to love Jesus as a Saviour, 
you will find Him as a comforter. You will feel 
your yoke hard, and your burden heavy. When 
in the day of trial, you open your Bible so long 
neglected, and read in it such words as these — 
" Whosoever doth not bear his cross and come af- 
ter Me, cannot be My disciple ;" " he that loveth 
father and mother more than Me, is not worthy 
of Me ; and he that loveth son or daughter more 
than Me, is not worthy of Me f will you be com- 
forted? will you feel satisfied ? will you have ob- 
tained that which you sought for in the Gospel? 

7 



74 MEDITATION II. 

And yet you will find nothing else there until you 
have learned to love Jesus, until you have surren- 
dered your heart to Him, until the love of Jesus 
has rendered His yoke easy and His burden light, 
until you have ceased to follow Him from a worldly 
selfishness, and for the loaves and fishes. We be- 
lieve that this selfish kind of piety, without devo- 
tedness to the Saviour, is not found exclusively in 
the people of the world, who are only religious to 
suit their own convenience; but we are persuaded 
that such " roots of bitterness" put forth their fibres 
in a great many Christians also, who, perhaps 
without suspecting it, seek in the Gospel only their 
own satisfaction, and would abandon their God 
and Saviour the moment they could hope to be 
happy without Him, without His grace, without 
the attractions of His doctrine, and the consolation 
of His word ; shall we, then, be surprised at the 
little progress which they make in real love, in 
devotedness to Christ and to His cause, and in 
holiness, " without which no man shall see the 
Lord?" 

Other persons are in danger of falling into a 
different error, from seeing the friends of Jesus 
subjected to the sufferings and afflictions of life 
Jjike Asaph,* they' are offended at this. How 
does it happen, say they in their troubled heart 
that God exposes his child to all these trials, while 
such a man of the world, who lives in forge tfulness 
of God, and as if he had no immortal soul to be 
saved, enjoys what men call happiness ? "I was 

• Psalm lxxiii. 



LAZARUS SICK. 75 

envious at the foolish, when I saw the prosperity 
of the wicked. They are not in trouble as other 
men ; neither are they plagued like other men. 
Therefore His people return hither ; the waters 
of a full cup are wrung out to them ; and they say, 
How doth God know? and is there knowledge in 
the Most High? Behold, these are the ungodly 
who prosper in the world : they increase in riches. 
Verily I have cleansed my heart in vain, and 
washed my hands in innocency. For all the day 
Long have I been plagued, and chastened every 
morning." Happy yet, if they come not, like the 
wife of Job, to say to the child of God in his suf- 
ferings, " Dost thou still retain thine integrity ? 
Curse God, and die." 

Alas ! we know, as well as these miserable 
comforters, that the path by which the child of 
God travels across the desert is rough and thorny: 
we know that often, pressed down with a heavy 
burden, he appears to sigh in vain for deliverance ; 
that to him life is frequently a continual period 
of conflicts and of pain: oftentimes it seems to 
him as if his complaint could not reach the ears 
of his God, a dense atmosphere and gloomy clouds 
bound his view, and allow not a ray of cheering 
hope to penetrate to his afflicted heart. And 
when we hear him cry with a voice enfeebled 
through grief, " Out of the depths have I called 
unto thee, O Lord ! As the hart panteth for the 
water brooks, even so panteth my soul after Thee, 

God ! My soul thirsteth for God. When shall 

1 come and appear before God ?" When we 



76 MEDITATION II. 

hear this plaintive voice, which so often in life 
strikes upon our ears, it readies the bottom of oui 
heart, and makes all its chords vibrate mournfully. 

But, O poor mortal ! suffering creature ! can 
you, then, see nothing bright and consoling in 
affliction ? Are you, then, altogether ignorant of 
the " rod, and Him that appointed it ? 7 ' Are the 
designs of God hidden from you? Do the pro- 
mises of God say nothing to your soul ? What is 
become of your faith ? Where is your hope ? Is 
God no more love ? Do you not see that His ob- 
ject is to save you as a " brand plucked out of the 
burning?" that He demands your heart, and that 
it is because you are unwilling to give it up en- 
tirely to Him, that He breaks with heavy blows 
the chains which keep back from Him a heart on 
which He has so many claims, and that it is the 
strokes of His love that reverberate so mournfully, 
even to the depths of your afflicted soul. Oh ! let 
a glance of faith pierce, like the eagle's eye, the 
thick cloud which envelops your heart, and be- 
yond it you will discover with joy Him who has 
so loved you as to save you — Him who still 
stretches out to you the arms of His infinite mercy. 

This is precise]y the example which the family 
of Bethany affords us on this occasion. How do 
Mary and Martha act in their affliction ? Doubt- 
less they begin by expending upon a beloved suf- 
fering brother all the cares which a tender affec- 
tion is ingenious to invent. They have nothing 
in common with those unfeeling persons, who, in- 
sensible to the sufferings of others, withdraw from 



LAZARUS S.'CK. 71 

the bed of pain, or from the house of mourning, 
and have never been moved by the lamentations 
of the afflicted. No, we love to represent to our- 
selves Martha, seeking with all her usual anxiety 
and activity, how she may offer some relief to a 
brother whom she loves: resting neither day nor 
night until she has tried every thing and put every 
thing in requisition in his behalf. We love still 
more perhaps to represent to ourselves Mary 
seated beside her brother's bed, watching to an- 
ticipate his least desires, finding in her deeply 
sensible and compassionate heart a thousand 
means of proving to him that he does not suffer 
alone, and that she participates in all his pains, 
seizing with the delicate tact of true love, the mo- 
ment for suggesting to him a word of consolation 
which reaches the heart, because it comes from 
the heart. It is thus we love to represent to our- 
selves this family. 

But it is not merely human means that the 
Christian has of being useful to those whom he 
loves, in their sufferings. Martha and Mary do 
not rest in these. St. John does not even men- 
tion the anxiety with which they attend upon 
their sick brother: he does not think it possible to 
suppose that those two sisters, whom Jesus loved, 
could have acted towards their brother otherwise 
than under the influence of the most ardent affec- 
tion. But he tells us, he seems to take pleasure 
in telling us, " his sisters sent unto Him," i. e, 
unto Jesus, " saying, Lord, behold, he whom Thou 

lovest is sick." What conduct ! What a prayer ( 

7# 



78 MEDITATION H. 

" His sisters sent unto Him." Disciples of Christ 
is it thus you act in the hour of trial 1 Do we 
not rather find you telling of your afflictions, and 
complaining of them to your neighbours, your re- 
latives, or your friends, before you have said a 
single word of them to Jesus ? Do we not see 
you going from place to place, and anxiously seek- 
ing for help while you forget the source of every 
good and every perfect gift 2 

Do we not see you afflicting yourselves, weep- 
ing bitterly, and forgetting Him who hath said, 
M I, even I, am He that comforteth you ?" Do 
we not see you, when one of those whom you love 
is sick, expecting every thing from the talents of 
a physician, from the remedies which he pre- 
scribes, and from your own care, while in your 
trouble you forget Him, who woundeth and heal- 
eth, who killeth and maketh alive, who bringeth 
down to the grave, and raiseth up again, and who 
is called the Prince of Life 7 Ah ! why then 
should you be astonished if, when sickness and 
death have brought grief and mourning into your 
families, you have found only bitterness without 
alleviation, a frightful void which nothing could 
fill up, and anguish which nothing could sooth ? 
Jesus was the only friend who could then have 
spoken a word of consolation and of peace to 
your soul ; but Jesus you have forgotten, Him you 
have neglected to call to your assistance. Oh ! 
might it not then have been said of you with 
truth, as it was of the ancient people of God, 
"My people have committed two evils; they have 



LAZARUS SICK. 79 

forsaken Me, the fountain of living waters, and 
hewed them out cisterns, broken cisterns, that can 
hold no water," (Jer. ii. 13.) " O the Hope of 
Israel, the Saviour thereof in the time of trouble, 
why shouldest Thou be as a stranger in the land, 
and as a wayfaring man that turneth aside to 
tarry for the night? why shouldest Thou be as a 
man astonied, as a mighty man that cannot save ? 
Yet Thou, O Lord, art in the midst of us, and we 
are called by Thy name ; leave us not." (Jer. xiv. 
8, 9.) Far otherwise do the sisters of Lazarus 
act; they send to Jesus; and what do they ask 
of Him? It is scarcely a prayer that escapes 
from their afflicted heart. They believe in the 
love of Jesus, and in that Almighty power which 
is given unto Him in heaven and in earth: they 
know that the cry of the afflicted has never reach- 
ed His compassionate heart in vain : they know 
that He has stretched out a helping hand to all 
the unhappy beings that have ever come to Him 
for relief ; this is enough for them: "Lord," say 
they, " he whom Thou West is sick." What 
confidence ! What faith ! What a touching 
prayer ! O my beloved friends, if you thus know 
the Lord Jesus ; if you have found in Him the 
powerful Saviour of your souls ; if you know that 
you belong to Him, that He loves you ; if, through 
faith in His word, you know that nothing can 
separate you from His everlasting love, you will 
go to Him in your trials, with the confidence of 
Martha and Mary. He who is your Saviour will 
also be your Comforter: you will be assured that 



80 MEDITATION II. 

" He who has given you His Son will also with 
Him freely give you all things;" and when you 
think of the eternity of bliss which He has pur- 
chased for you, and given you freely, you will be 
ashamed of being cast down, and of distrusting 
His faithfulness and love, during the short mo- 
ments which still separate you from that eternity. 
Then in all your trials, whether temporal or spirit- 
ual, you will need for yourselves, or those whom 
you love, nothing more than that word, so simple, 
so touching, so sublime, " Lord, he whom Thou 
lovest is sick." Open thus your soul to Jesus ; lay 
before Him with simplicity your miseries. This 
is sufficient to touch His heart with compassion. 
Say to Him in all your wants, in all your suffer- 
in gs, or in the trials of those whom you love, 
" Lord, he whom Thou lovest" endures the ago- 
nies of death ; " he whom Thou lovest" is ex- 
posed to temptations or to doubts ; " he whom 
Thou lovest mourns over his weakness; the cold- 
ness of his love for Thee, his remissness in Thy 
service, the sin which still dwells in him ; "he 
whom Thou lovest is sick." Ah ! if it be not 
thus that you love your brethren ; if it be not to 
present them to Jesus, to lead them to Him, as it 
were by the hand, to tell Him in the case of every 
new infirmity which you discover in them, or of 
every new affliction which you see them suffer ; 
"Lord, he whom Thou lovest is sick;" if it be 
not thus that you love your brethren, be assured 
that you do not love them at all, or that you dc 
not love them as you ought. 



THE GL0R" OF GOD. 81 

Jesus said. " This sickness is not unto death, 
but for the glory of God, that the Son of God 
might be glorified thereby." 

What an answer ! what a mysterious answer ! 
It might have been expected that Jesus, as soon 
as He had heard the message of Martha and 
Mary, would have arisen, and said to His disci- 
ples, as He did at a later period, " Let us go into 
Judea again ; let us go to Bethany ; let us go and 
assist our friend Lazarus." Not so ; Jesus gives 
an answer not easy to be understood — an answer 
which theologians of all ages have explained ac- 
cording to their own peculiar views — an answer 
as much calculated to exercise the faith of the 
sisters of Lazarus, as the sagacity of commenta- 
tors. What ! they have said, " this sicuness is not 
unto death!" but did not Lazarus die of it? 
Could Jesus have been deceived; and if not, what 
does He mean? " This sickness is not unto death, 
but for the glory of God, that the Son of God may 
be glorified thereby ;" and yet Lazarus dies and 
goes down to the grave ! Is it then from the tomb 
that the Son of God intends to draw r His glory 
and His praise ? What a trial for the faith of the 
sisters of Lazarus ! Will they not fall into doubt, 
mistrust, unbelief? The sequel of the history will 
clear up all obscurity for us, as it did for Martha 
and Mary ; meanwhile, O my soul, receive in- 
struction ; learn to adore the dispensations of thy 
God, even when they are still enveloped in a veil 
of obscurity ! The Lord's " thoughts are not as 
our thoughts, nor His ways as our ways ; for as 



82 MEDITATION II. 

the heavens are higher than the earth, so are His 
ways higher than our ways, and His thoughts 
than our thoughts." Martha and Mary speak to 
Jesus only of their brother's sickness; Jesus, an 
swering as the Prince of life, who has dominion 
over death and the grave, speaks only of the glory 
of God, and of the glory of the Son of God. 
What a lesson for us, my beloved brethren ! In 
our narrow and limited views, we see but the pre- 
sent moment: Christ, in His dispensations towards 
us, sees our eternal destinies. We see but the 
wants which press upon us, the deliverance for 
which we sigh and weep : Christ sees an eternal 
destination, which He would make us reach by 
ways unknown to ourselves. We see but our 
earthly and mortal body : Christ sees our immor- 
tal soul. We see but time : Christ sees eternity; 
and above all things, and in all things, " the glory 
of God." Whoever we are, whatever be our 
condition, or our rank in the world, there is but 
one destination for which we, and the whole of 
the immense creation can have been called into 
existence : u the glory of God, the glory of the son 
of God." 

Oh ! if we could but comprehend this important 
truth, if it could but fill our hearts, possess our 
whole soul, soon would we find that mean and 
narrow selfishness, — which causes us to refer every 
thing to ourselves, make;* us our own idol, and is 
the source of all our miseries, — disappearing from 
our view. Soon would we feel that we ought to 
consecrate ourselves with all that we have, as a 






THE GLORY OF GOD. 83 

living sacrifice, holy and acceptable, to the glory 
of God, and to the glory of the Son of God. Soon 
would we overturn those idols which we have set 
up upon the throne of our selfishness, and offer 
them as a sacrifice to the glory of God. Soon 
would we trample under our foot that hideous 
monster, our pride, to give all glory to Him who 
hath created and saved us. Soon would we tear 
from ourselves, and from every thing human, even 
the last floweret of that crown which our pride 
has usurped, and place it entire upon the Divine 
head of the Son of God. In fine, soon would we 
resume our place in the eternal order of creation. 
And what does it matter in what way it may 
please the Lord to make us reach this noble end? 
Lazarus is laid upon a bed of pain ; it is there he 
must subserve the glory of God, while St. John 
and St. Paul shall proclaim the same glory, by 
preaching the offence of the cross of Christ. 
Lazarus dies ; he descends into the tomb : and 
this death, this tomb, shall proclaim the glory of 
the Son of God, as loudly as all the worlds of the 
vast universe, when they issued from His creating 
hand. Oh ! let us learn to know God ! Let us 
remember that He could not have assigned any 
other end to our existence than His own glory; 
and that for us to glorify Him is to accomplish and 
to adore His sovereign will, which is always good 
and perfect. Let us remember, in fine, that we 
may accomplish and adore that will upon a pallet, 
in the midst of sufferings and sacrifices, just as 
effectually as in the most splendid career. Alasf 



84 MEDITATION II. 

we are so blind, we are so accustomed to judge 
by appearances, that too generally the words 
happi?iess and misery in our mouths express nothing 
but a deplorable folly. If an angel of God, pos- 
sessing all knowledge, could look down from 
heaven upon the obscure life of some child of 
Adam, whom his fellow-men call miserable, that 
inhabitant of heaven would perhaps seize his im- 
mortal harp, and chaunt the happiness of him 
whose condition appears to us so deserving of 
pity ; whilst that angel, if he were not in that 
abode where there are no more tears, would weep 
bitterly over the misery of some other mortal, 
whose destiny is an object of envy to his fellow- 
men. The one is going to attain, through suffer- 
ing, the end of his being, the glory of God ; the 
other, in the midst of prosperity, lives in forget- 
fulness of the end of life, the glory of God. 

What a solemn thought! that at the end of 
time, every thing that has been created shall be 
summoned to proclaim, before the whole universe, 
the glory of God, either by cnaunting,with all the 
pure intelligences of heaven, the hymn of His 
eternal love, or by rendering, with all the repro- 
bate of the abyss of woe, the fearful testimony 
that God is just when He condemns. O Lord! I 
prostrate myself before Thee in the dust ; I hasten, 
while there is yet time, to lay at Thy feet my re- 
bellious will, crying, Glory to Thee ! And the 
prayer of my soul is, that all the thoughts, all the 
affections of my heart, as well as all the actions 



THE GLORY OF GOD. 85 

of my life, may repeat before all, Glory to Thee 
and that the last accents of my expiring voice 
may still send up to the foot of Thine eternal 
throne, this cry of adoration and of love, Glory to 
Thee ! Glory to Thee ! ! . 



MEDITATION III. 



THE LOVE OF JESUS, AND THE TRIAL OP 
FAITH. 



John xi. 5, 6. 

"Now Jesus loved Martha, and her sister, and Lazarus ; when He 
had heard, therefore, that he was sick, He abode two days still in 
the same place where He was." 

" Lord, he whom Thou lovest is sick." Such 
was the touching prayer of Martha and Mary, 
when their brother was seized with a painful sick- 
ness. " This sickness is not unto death," an- 
swered Jesus, " but for the glory of God, that the 
Son of God may be glorified thereby." Upon 
this answer the sisters of Lazarus hope and wait. 
Our historian now conducts us beyond Jordan, 
into the society of Jesus and his disciples, where 
we shall follow Him, and hear Him, until we are 
led back to Bethany, to the tomb of Lazarus. 

St. John continues his narrative, informing us 
that his Master, (always so ready to respond to 
the cry of the afflicted,) contrary to all expecta- 
tion, remains still two days in the place where He 
was, although he had heard of the sickness of liim 
whom He calls u His friend.' 1 But this beloved 



THE LOVE OP JESUS. 87 

disciple of the Redeemer is aware of the natural 
propensity of our poor heart to judge with rash- 
ness and precipitation of the ways of the Lord. 
He knows how easily we doubt the love of the 
Saviour, notwithstanding the numerous proofs of 
it which He has given us. He know show easily 
we believe ourselves to be forgotten, rejected, for- 
saken by Him. He knows how little we are dis- 
posed to persevere in prayer and in confidence, 
when we do not find our prayers immediately an- 
swered, and answered in the way in which we ex- 
pect He knows all our ingratitude, and there- 
fore it is, that before he tells us that Jesus abode 
still two days in the place where he was, before 
he acquaints us w T ith this mysterious conduct of 
the Saviour, which might discourage beings na- 
turally so unbelieving : his affectionate heart con- 
strains him to justify his Master's love ; he wishes 
to take away from us every pretext for a rash judg- 
ment ; he wishes to make us glance into the very 
heart of Jesus; and therefore he unveils to us its 
generous affections ; " Jesus" says he, ' loved 
Martha, and her sister, and Lazarus." What ex- 
quisite delicacy ! what love ! what a profound 
knowledge of our passions, our infirmities, our 
frailty, do we discover in this disciple ! Before 
he shows us the actions of his Master, he wishes 
always to make us penetrate into His motives ; he 
wishes to make us know the heart of Jesus as he 
knew it himself, persuaded that we shall find in 
that knowledge a thousand reasons to love Him, 
and to admire His dealings with us, however 



SB MEDITATION III. 

mysterious and however painful they may appear 
to us at first. Who will have the rashness to ac- 
cuse the Friend of Lazarus of negligence towards 
the family of Bethany in their affliction, though 
He delays to bring them the assistance of His 
omnipotence for two days, since the beloved dis- 
ciple has taken care to tell us beforehand, " Jesus 
loved Martha, and her sister, and Lazarus ?" 

O, my beloved brother, disciple of Christ, thou 
who groanest under thy sufferings ; though thou 
hast not a St. John always at hand to remind thee 
that Jesus loves thee, wilt thou doubt His love, 
when in His inscrutable wisdom He answers not 
thy prayers immediately ? No; thou wilt remem- 
ber that His love is always the same ; and that it 
is manifested in afflictions as well as in prosperity ; 
thou wilt hope, thou wilt wait ! And why should 
we not draw from hence the same lesson with re- 
gard to our christian friends on earth ? It often 
happens that we do not understand their manner 
of acting towards us ; we think that they neglect 
us j that they do not answer our affection ; that 
they do not sufficiently sympathize with us in our 
trials. Ah ! let us beware of judging harshly of 
their love, or we shall repent of it bitterly ; let us 
rather open our soul to that confidence which is 
the element of all true friendship ; let us believe 
that they love us, and let us wait. 

" Jesus loved Martha, and her sister, and Laza- 
rus." There is in this declaration a world of hap- 
piness. To be loved by Jesus ! all that the world 
calls happiness fades before such a thought. I 



THE LOVE OF JESUS. 89 

see the foolish votary of ambition exult with joy, 
when he is told that he is loved by some great one 
of the earth whose favour he sought after ; it seems 
to him as if every thing had changed its aspect, as 
if a new sun of happiness had arisen upon his life, 
and had come to shine upon the day of such feli- 
city. Alas ! a caprice of him in whom he has re- 
posed his delusive hope, is sufficient to plunge him 
into the darkness of despondency ; a moment is 
enough to change the joy of his heart into bitter- 
ness and weeping. 

I see another infatuated person expecting hap- 
piness from some beloved one whom he has made 
an idol. He is told that his love is returned. Im- 
mediately he sees all his dreams of felicity real- 
ized : he feels his heart bound with joy. Jacob 
did not see with greater happiness the approach- 
ing end of the fourteen years of bondage to which 
he had submitted for his beloved Rachel. Alas ! 
the inconstancy of the human heart, or the insta- 
bility of life, dashes his idol to pieces, annihilates 
his hopes, and fills his heart with bitter grief A 
tomb to bedew with his tears is, perhaps, all that 
remains to him of his fond dreams of happiness ; 
I call you to witness, is not this the history of your 
own hearts? Is not this what you have an op- 
portunity of observing every day in the most bril- 
liant circles of this vast metropolis, and what is 
seen as frequently under a more humble exterior, 
in the lowly abode of the artizan, and in the rus- 
tic cottage of the peasant? 

But, O Jesus ! O my Saviour ! how different is 
8* 



90 MEDITATION III. 

the lot of those whom Thou lovest ! Thou art 
always the same, yesterday, to-day, and for ever. 
Thou art always mighty to bless, to fill the heart 
of those whom Thou lovest with peace, joy, and 
happiness. And not only art Thou the mighty 
God, the Saviour ; but Thy love is salvation ! 
Thou hast come to procure for thy beloved onesj 
not a few passing moments of a happiness ever 
mingled with bitterness, but the eternity of a feli- 
city which poor mortals cannot conceive ! The 
love wherewith Thou lovest me is like Thyself, 
eternal ; and the same love shall constitute, in 
eternity, the element of my happiness! 

O happy family of Bethany ! happy Martha ! 
happy Mary ! happy Lazarus ! you are loved by 
Jesus ; what more do you require to make you 
blessed ! To you what are these trials, this sick- 
ness, this death, this sorrow, to which you are go- 
ing to be exposed ? — you are loved by Jesus ! 

Wretched mortals that we are ! we often love 
that which we scarcely know ; we cannot read the 
heart, we see but the outside. Often when we 
have reposed our confidence in some being whom 
we deemed worthy of it, all our hopes are frus- 
trated, our expectations disappointed: often, too, 
when we receive from those who are dear to us 
testimonies of their affection, a secret feeling of 
our unworthiness compels us to say within our- 
selves — Alas ! if they knew me better ! But Je- 
sus, He of whom we are told that He loved Mar- 
tha and Mary, is He who " searcheth the hearts 
and the reins." What a testimony for them! 



THE LOVE OF JESUS. 91 

What a privilege, the happiness of being loved by 
Him who reads in the depths of the heart its most 
secret thoughts, inclinations, and dispositions. 
Ah ! though it was not required of Lazarus and 
his sisters that they should merit His love, for 
alas ! on such terms Jesus would not have found 
among the whole race of Adam a single being 
whom He could have loved ; it was at least re- 
quired of them that their heart should be really 
open to His love ; it was required that they should 
love communion with Him ; that they should love 
His word ; that they should love His love. 

Doubtless, my beloved brethren, you would all 
wish to be partakers of the happiness of this blessed 
family of Bethany. Doubtless, there is not one 
among you that would not wish that it could be 
said of him, that he is loved by Jesus ; that Jesus 
is his friend ; that, like all the members of that 
family, he is the particular object of His affection. 
Well, this happiness is not beyond your reach. 
There is a sense in which it can be said of you, 
that you are already the objects of the love of Je- 
sus. Was it not love, that induced Him to leave 
the abode of glory and felicity, and come to share 
in your miseries, and to deliver you from them? 
Was it not love, that achieved the work of redemp- 
tion, the glad tidings of which He has caused to 
be proclaimed in your ears? Is it not because 
He loves you, that we are here to invite you, on 
His part, to believe in His love, in order that you 
may participate in the eternal blessings of which 
that love is the source % 



92 MEDITATION III. 

But you say, This is not enough ; we know 
that "■ God so loved the world that He gave His 
only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in 
Him might not perish, but have everlasting life." 
But Jesus loved the family of Bethany in a spe- 
cial manner ; He calls Lazarus " His friend." 
St. John tells us, as speaking of the most exalted 
privilege, u Jesus loved Martha, and her sister, 
and Lazarus." They were then His bosom 
friends ; their names remain on the pages of the 
book of life as eternal monuments of the special 
affection of Jesus. 

All this is true, my dear brethren, but we 
repeat it again, that this happiness is not inacces- 
sible to you. Jesus is the same to love you that 
he was eighteen hundred years ago. And what 
had Lazarus and his sisters done to become the 
friends of Jesus ? We have said that their hearts 
through grace were opened to His love, to His 
word, to communion with Him. This is all that 
Jesus required of them ; this is all he asks from 
you. They were not distinguished for their 
splendid actions, nor for a life which they could 
have looked upon as meritorious. They had not, 
like Paul, filled the world with the sound of the 
Gospel of Christ ; they had not, like John, been 
banished for the cause of God's word ; they had 
not, like Stephen, given a splendid testimony to 
the truth at the peril of their lives. They had 
done nothing of the kind ; they were not even 
called to it, and yet Jesus loved them. Martha 
confessed Jesus by faith, " Lord, I believe that 



THE LOVE OF JESUS. 93 

fhou art the Christ, the Son of God, which should 
come into the world." u Mary sat at the feet of 
Jesus, and heard His word." Lazarus glorified 
Him by his submission on a bed of suffering ; and 
it was in this humble condition that Jesus loved 
them. O my beloved brethren, you who wish to 
find, in your heart, or in your life, some proofs 
that you are loved by Jesus, as Lazarus and his 
sisters were, seek not these proofs in great and 
lofty things. Come to Jesus; ask Him to love 
you ; descend into the depths of your heart, 
abased and humbled before . Him, and there He 
will speak to you, by His Spirit of peace, of re- 
conciliation, and of love. Be not distressed be- 
cause the scantiness of your means allows you 
net to perform your part in a great and splendid 
sphere of activity in His service. Mourn not 
because your weakness, your infirmities, or other 
causes, keep you in such an humble condition 
that you cannot conceive how Jesus should con- 
descend to love you. Ah ! never forget that His 
love is free ; it is not deserved ; He gives it. 
Rather ask yourselves whether you really wish 
to attain the assurance that you are loved by 
Him? Ask yourselves, "Have I opened my 
heart to the love of Jesus? Do His promises 
speak to my soul ? Is He a Saviour to me ? 
Have / found pardon and peace in Him ? Does 
my soul feel a want of His presence which no 
man, no angel of God, none but Jesus, Jesus 
alone can satisfy ? Do I love His word ? Is it 
my happines to sit at His feet, like Mary, and to 



94 MEDITATION* IIL 

t 

hear Him speak of my heavenly country? Does 
my soul thirst after the living God ? Does it 
experience continually fresh desires to approach 
the Lord by prayer, as a child ever finds a new 
pleasure in throwing itself into the arms of a 
tenderly beloved parent ? And in my trials, my 
sicknesses, my anxieties, is it to Him that I cry im- 
mediately for deliverance ? Am I able to recog- 
nize His gracious hand in all my sorrows and 
afflictions? Is my heart submissive? Is my 
head bowed down in silent adoration when His 
hand lies heavy upon me? Where do I, at such 
times, seek for consolation? Is it in His word, in 
His promises, in the assurance of His eternal 
love ; or in worldly thoughts, and vain hopes ? 
What is it that spreads some degree of serenity 
over the darkest and saddest hours of my life ? 
Am I well assured that the difficult and painful 
path which he makes me tread is that most con- 
ducive to my eternal happiness ? and that ' all 
things work together for good to them that love 
God?' ' And should you find in your heart but 
the sincere desire to answer these questions In a 
satisfactory manner, believe that Jesus loves you ; 
and rejoice in His love ! 

But be not deceived; if it be in the world, in 
the creature, in the satisfying of your own will, 
your desires, your passions, that you look for hap- 
piness, you can have no part in the sweet privi- 
leges of the family of Bethany. " Ye adulterers 
and adulteresses, know ye not that the friendship 
of the world is enmity against God? Whosoever 



THE LOVE OF JESUS. 95 

therefore, will be a friend of the world, is the 
enemy of God." " If any man love the world, 
the love of the Father is not in him." What ! 
you wish, you say, it could be said of you, that 
Jesus loved you, while your heart, which ought tc 
feel that love, belongs to a world which crucified 
the Lord ! Your heart cleaves to those sins which 
nailed Jesus to the cross ! Your heart has never 
opened to the love of the Saviour ; and the thought 
of Jesus is the last that presents itself to your 
mind ! And his name is neither in your hearts, 
nor upon your lips, nor in . your families, nor in 
your assemblies, nor in your drawing-rooms! Is 
it thus you would treat a creature for whom you 
had the least affection ? Ah ! you must first re- 
nounce yourselves and all the vanities which cap- 
tivate your hearts, and return to the love of your 
redeeming God, before you can taste the happi- 
ness of being loved by Jesus, the happiness of the 
family of Bethany. 

If you possess the love of Jesus, all is well, 
eternally well, even though you should be over- 
whelmed with all the miseries of this mortal life ; 
but if you are without that love, all is ill, eternally 
ill, even though you should be loaded with all that 
men have the folly to call happiness. 

" Jesus loved Martha, and her sister, and Laza- 
rus," Such is the language which escaped from 
the heart of St. John, language which ought to 
anticipate in the minds of his readers, all doubt, 
all unbelief, every murmur in reference to the 
conduct of Jesus, who, the Evangelist tell us, 



96 MEDITATION IIL 

" abode two days still in the same place where 
He was," after He had heard that Lazarus was 
sick. 

But why this delay? Why does not Jesus fly 
as usual to the assistance of an afflicted family 
whom He loves ? Why does He not pronounce 
a word of His power, and Lazarus shall be heal- 
ed ? What ! Jesus loves Lazarus, and yet He 
leaves him a prey to suffering ! Jesus loves Mar- 
tha and Mary, and yet He leaves them a prey to 
anguish ! The disease makes frightful advances ; 
Lazarus feels the sources of life drying up within 
his breast ; his sisters with grief behold the veil 
of death spreading over his eyes ; the tears of all 
flow in abundance at the thought of the approach- 
ing separation — and Jesus, their Divine Friend, 
who never remained insensible to any of our hu- 
man miseries, Jesus arrives not ! Two entire 
days pass away — Lazarus dies — and Jesus is not 
there ! Can this be a proof of His love ? Is it 
true that He loves Martha, and Mary, and Laza- 
rus ? 

Thus reasons the man who understands not the 
" ways of the Lord," who sees in grief nothing 
but grief, in trials nothing but the trial, and who 
appreciates deliverance only in proportion to the 
promptitude with which it is vouchsafed. But 
Jesus, who in all things aims at " the glory of 
God," and the eternal salvation of souls, does not 
sanction in His disciples this cowardly fear of suf- 
fering. He wishes to teach them to love His will 
more than their own enjoyment, to desire the 



THE TRIAL OF FAITH. 97 

feeling of His love more than their own deliv- 
erance: even in His most painful dispensations. 
Can I not appeal to your own experience, my 
dear brethren, whom the Lord hath caused to 
pass through the furnace of affliction ? Have not 
your trials taught you this great truth? What 
has been the first cry which has escaped from 
your heart at such moments? What have you 
felt when the Lord has not answered that cry ? 
when He has allowed your grief and your distress 
to go on augmenting ; when He has allowed you 
to spend long nights in painful sleeplessness; or 
when He has called you to watch over the bed of 
?ome beloved relative whom disease was wasting 
away ? Tell it for our instruction, and that we 
may profit by your experience ; have you not 
thought that the Lord would remain for ever deaf 
io your supplications and to your sighs? Have 
you not doubted the efficacy of prayer? Were 
not the promises of God without power to your 
heart ? Say, also, have you not been constrained 
to acknowlodge that it was so, because you had 
not yet been really humbled under the hand of 
God ; because you had not bowed your head in 
submission to His will ; because you sighed only 
to be delivered from the evils that weighed upon 
your soul ; because that after you had prayed, 
u O God, if it be possible, let this cup pass from 
me," you had not courage to add, with sincerity, 
" Nevertheless, not my will, but Thine be done?" 
u O fools, and slow of heart to believe all that 
the prophets have spoken!" When shall we learn 

9 



*?8 MEDITATION III. 

that the Lord's " ways are not our ways, nor His 
thoughts our thoughts?" When shall we learn to 
subdue., by the assistance of His grace, the vehe- 
ment desires of our impatient spirit, to silence the 
insinuations of our unbelieving hearts, to bend our 
rebellious will ? Shall we always be governed b^ 
the selfish interest of the moment, and never be 
able to rise to the contemplation of the plans of a 
merciful God who willeth our everlasting salva- 
tion? Let us "speak to the earth, and it shall 
teach us." The powerful tree that is to strike its 
deep roots into a fertile soil, and bear fruit which 
shall ripen to perfection, requires that the winds 
and the storms should contribute to its growth ; it 
is only the ephemeral plant that grows without 
impediment ; its flower blossoms in the morning ; 
it displays for a moment its delicate freshness and 
its opening beauty ; it adorns a day of spring and 
embalms it with its delicious perfume ; — alas ! the 
first ray of the sun destroys its freshness, the first 
blast of wind makes its beauty fade ; it withers * 
it falls, and the place thereof knoweth it no more ! 
But the tree which shall hereafter recompense 
the care of the planter, rises slowly and with diffi- 
culty, above the ground which it shall one day 
overshadow ; it requires years to stretch out its 
deep roots and its fruitful branches; the storms 
harden and strengthen it ; it reaches its towering 
height ; it braves the tempest, and disappoints not 
the traveller who comes to repose beneath its 
shade and to refresh himself with its fruits. It is 
the same in the kingdom of grace as in that of 



THE TRIAL OF FAITH. 99 

>ature. The soul that shall ci dwell in the house 
^f the Lord for ever, to behold the beauty of the 
Lord, and to inquire in His holy temple," must be 
prepared for this by combats and trials. This is 
the method of training which the Lord has inva- 
riable used with all those of His children whom 
He has proposed to exalt to eminent stations, and 
to employ for the instruction and enlightening of 
ages. 

He has made them all tread the gloomy paths 
of affliction ; He has cast them into the furnace, 
that their faith might come forth purified from the 
defilements of pride and of sin. Abraham, the 
father of the faithful, proceeds from trial to trial, 
from contest to contest ; he travels a dark road as 
unknown to him as Mount Moriah, where he was 
to sacrifice the object of his dearest affections; he 
has to hope against hope. On the contrary, the 
Lord appears o render His ways more easy to the 
less privileged objects of His love. A centurion 
of Capernaum, who perhaps scarcely knows the 
God whom the heathen reject, comes to Jesus to 
ask Him to heal a beloved servant : immediately 
he receives from Him the answer, " I will come 
and heal him ;" and "his servant is healed in the 
selfsame hour." Two poor blind men hear that 
He, who was known to all Israel by His acts of 
mercy, passes by ; with a loud voice they suppli- 
cate from Hirn a look of compassion ; He stops, 
speak a word of favour, and the blind men re- 
ceive their sight. But the woman of Canaan, a 
heroine of faith, whose only daughter is at the point 



100 MEDITATION III. 

of death, comes to Jesus ; with tears she implores 
comfort and assistance from Him — she receives a 
harsh reply — a refusal of all favour ! But hy this 
means she is led to exhibit to all Israel and to all 
future ages a most splendid example of victorious 
faith. The great Apostle Paul himself three 
times prays to be delivered from some painful 
trial, and he receives for an answer these words — 
" My grace is sufficient for thee ;" " My strength 
shall be made perfect in thy weakness." Thus 
the Lord leads His children ; He seems insensible 
to their cries of grief; darkness thickens around 
them ; the night becomes more deep ; but it is 
only to render more bright the dawn of the day 
of consolation. Often it is when the heart, over- 
powered, ceases to send up to heaven those sighs 
which it deems useless ; when the last ray of hope 
has expired amid the gloom of distress; when all 
assistance appears impossible, and all human con- 
solation has vanished, that Jesus Christ presents 
Himself to his child and changes his darkness into 
light, — his tears into songs of thanksgiving. 

It is not till Lazarus has sunk into the cold em- 
braces of death ; till he has gone down into the 
grave ; and his sisters, in tears, and clothed in the 
garb of mourning, imagine that they have now no 
other comfort in this world, but to go and weep 
over the tomb of a beloved brother, that Jesus 
appears at Bethany, and with the authority of a 
master, issues His commands to death and the 
grave, and draws glory to God from the dust of 
the tomb. O the wisdom, the power, the love 01 



THE TRIAL OF FAITH. 101 

my God ! when shall we learn to know them, to 
adore them, to submit ourselves in a religious 
silence to all that they do for our eternal happi- 
ness ? The divines of this world, ignorant of the 
ways of God with His children, whose sanctifica- 
tion and salvation He so graciously designs, have 
devised a thousand hypotheses for explaining the 
conduct of Jesus in leaving His friend for two days, 
in a state of suffering, without assistance. One 
tells us that He was detained by some indispen- 
sable engagement; another, that He did not think 
Lazarus in danger ; a third— Fools ! will you then 
always lose sight of the glory of God, and the sal- 
vation of immortal souls ? Will you think only 
of earth, of sickness, of pain, of death, and never 
of the eternal happiness of beings whom Jesus 
forms for heaven, in the school of affliction and of 
His Spirit ? Let us raise our thoughts higher, if 
we would comprehend the ways of God and His 
counsels towards us. " He willeth not the death 
of a sinner," but his conversion and life. He 
willeth not that His children, whom He hath 
already converted, should remain entangled in the 
servile chains of the world and of corruption. He 
breaks those chains ; and if the blows which he 
strikes ring mournfully in our heart, let us learn 
to " bear the rod, and Him that appointed it." 
My God ! what wilt Thou have me to do ? What 
sacrifice shall I make ? What idol shall I offer 
upon the altar of Thine eternal love ? Since 
Thou hast saved me, since Thou hast loved me, 

9* 



102 MEDITATION III. 

show me by what path Thou wouldest have me 
to reach Thy heavenly Zion, the assembly of the 
first-born — the place where all those who have a 
heart to love Thee shall meet, and where nothing 
that defileth shall ever enter ! 



MEDITATION IV. 



THE HEROISM OF JESUS.— THE TWELVE 
HOURS OF THE DAY. 



John xi. 7- — 10. 



* Then after that saith He to His disciples, Let us go into Judea 
again. His disciples say unto Him. Master, the Jews of late sought 
to stone Thee ; and goest Thou thither again 1 Jesus answered, 
Are there not twelve hours in the day? If any man walk in the 
day, he stumbleth not, because he seeth the light of this world. 
But if a man walk in the night, he stumbleth, because there is no 
light in him." 

The two virtues which appear to us to consti- 
tute what is called heroism, are, courage and de- 
votedness. The names which we see emblazoned 
on the page of history, surrounded with pompous 
eulogiums, are the names of those men, who, for- 
getting themselves and their personal interests, 
have had the courage to devote themselves to 
sufferings and death, for the salvation of their 
country, the happiness of some being that was 
dear to them, or for some other praiseworthy cause. 
We admire this courage, this devotedness ; we 
delight to peruse the magnanimous examples of a 
sublime heroism. But, alas , as a great man of 
our day has very well said, ■< Even heroism, the 



104 MEDITATION IV. 

greatest and purest of virtues, heroism itself, when 
closely inspected, is found to have its blemishes."* 
And what would the celebrated author, whom we 
have quoted, have said, had he judged of heroism 
by the light of God's eternal truth 1 What would 
he have said, had he analyzed by the lamp of the 
Divine Word, all the elements of pride, vanity, 
and selfishness, which are ever mingled with tie 
sublimest displays of a conduct heroic in the eyes 
of men? Oh, what would become of the most 
brilliant performances of many whose names are 
re-echoed from age to age, whose memory ap- 
pears in the past, surrounded with a halo of glory ; 
were they weighed in the balance of eternal jus- 
tice ? Would we not see that mysterious hand 
which arrested the king of Babylon in the midst 
of his vanities, writing upon their most splendid 
exploits the fearful Tekel of the prophet, c; Thou 
art weighed in the balance, and found wanting T 7 
Thou knowest, my God, and it is not for us to de- 
clare it. 

But let us bless God, my beloved brethren, that 
He has given us to know another kind of courage 
and devotedness celebrated not by men, who often 
call good evil, and evil good ; but by the angels 
of God, upon golden harps of eternal praise ! The 
Redeemer of the world, in the devotedness which 
led Him to leave the heavens, and come down to 
share our miseries and deliver us from them, is 
exhibited to us in His whole life, but especially in 
that particular part of it which is recorded in the 

• Victor Cousin. " Introduction t » the History of Philosophy.** 



THE HEROISM OF JESUS. 105 

text, as the perfect model of a divine heroism, ap- 
proved of by God ; and He cries to us all, " I 
have left you an example, that ye might follow 
My steps." 

Come, then, disciples of Christ ; come, also, 
men of the world, you who are capable of appre- 
ciating what is beautiful, and grand, and sublime, 
and noble ; come, and let us study our model, and 
may we be enabled, not to confine ourselves 
merely to a vain and unprofitable admiration, but 
to arise without delay, and enter with a coura- 
geous step upon the career in which our Divine 
Captain leads us ! The de votedness of Jesus, and 
the considerations which it ought to suggest to us, 
are the lesson we would draw from the words 
which form the subject of our meditation. 

Lord ! take away from us that sluggish apathy 
which renders us indifferent to what ought to kin- 
dle our enthusiasm ! Eradicate from our hearts, 
by (he power of Thy Spirit, that selfishness which 
benumbs our energies, and hinders us from com- 
ing out of ourselves to rise up to the contemplation 
of this divine exhibition which Thou hast placed 
before the eyes of a sinful world, and which is cal- 
culated to excite the admiration of angels, and be- 
come the theme of our praises throughout eternity ! 

Jesus was beyond T ordan, whither He had been 
obliged to fly from the hatred and persecution of 
the rulers of the people. He remained there two 
days after Martha and her sister had informed 
Him of the anxieties in which they were involved 
on account of their brother ; two days of suffering 



106 MEDITATION IV. 

to Lazarus ; two days of painful expectation, to his 
sisters; but also, we cannot dcubt, two days of 
works of benevolence and charity, on the part of 
Him who went about doing good, and whose meat 
it was to do the will of Him that sent Him. and 
to finish His work : yes, while sickness and death 
introduced mourning and tears into the abode of 
Bethany, the beneficent hand of Jesus brought 
into some other afflicted family consolation and 
relief, and into some other troubled and suffering 
soul pardon and peace. But if those whom He 
loves most are often the last to whom Jesus brings 
assistance, they are not forgotten in His heart. 
No, He guards them by His almighty power, " as 
the apple of His eye," u as the eagle stirreth up 
her nest, fluttereth over her young, spreadeth 
abroad her wings, taketh them, beareth them on 
her wings." Jesus is beyond Jordan, exiled by 
the persecutions of those whom He came to save; 
but from thence He beholds all that takes place 
at Bethany; He counts the groans of Lazarus, 
and the tears of his sisters ; He has seen Him 
whom He loved become the prey of death ; He 
has beheld the grief of the two sisters who so often 
received Him under their humble roof He sees 
that the trial is sufficiently great, too great per- 
haps for their faith ; and as He willeth not that 
they should be " tempted above what they are 
able to bear." His compassionate heart urges Him 
to come to tbeir assistance : *' Let us go again," 
saith He to His disciples, u into Judea." 

But, my beloved brethren, if you are acquainted 



THE HEROISM OF JESUS. 107 

with suffering ; if God afflicts you in any way, to 
bring you to Himself and to make you wise unto 
salvation ; if when you send up your prayers and 
supplications to Him, He seems not to answer 
them; if He makes you wait two days, two weeks, 
two years, be not discouraged ; learn to know the 
ways of His love and of His grace : learn to hope, 
to believe, to love, for soon, soon shall this word 
of compassion issue from His heart, c; Let us go 
again into Judeaj" let us go again into this soul, 
which is ready to sink down in the contest, and 
sighs for deliverance ; let us go again into this 
heart, which is torn by suffering and anguish. 

But here an objection occurs which will lead us 
more directly to the subject of our meditation this 
day. Scarcely had Jesus uttered these words, 
4 * Let us go again into Judea," when a voice ex- 
claims, " Master, the Jews of late sought to stone 
Thee ; and goest Thou thither again?" It is un- 
necessary to say that it is the disciples that have 
spoken. They remember with trembling, that at 
the last feast, the Jews took up stones to stone 
their Master, as St. John tells us in the end of the 
preceding chapter. It is this anxiety alone for 
their Master and for themselves that makes them 
speak. They lose sight of every thing else ; they 
forget the family of Bethany in their affliction ; 
they forget, or they have not yet comprehended, 
the true end of the divine mission of their Master, 
who is to die for the- salvation of His people. 
Fear and selfishness alone speak : u Master, goest 
Thou thither again?" 



108 MEDITATION IV 

Alas ! we must not censure them too severely . 
they expressed no more than what we ourselves 
would have felt in their place. There exists in 
our heart a deep-rooted cowardice and selfishness, 
which makes everything disappear before our 
own interests, makes us tremble at the view of 
sacrifice and pain, as the disciples did at the 
remembrance of the stones which the Jews took 
up to stone their Master. A voice is lifted up in 
our heart : it is the echo of that of the disciples ; 
" What ! wilt thou again perform this good work, 
which cost thee so much self-denial, and sorrow, 
and fatigue ? Wilt thou rigourously fulfil, at the 
expense of thy comfort, the will of God, and its 
severe requirements? What! wilt thou follow 
Jesus, though in doing so thou must renounce thy 
tastes, thy pleasures, this object of thy passion, 
the world, thyself? Wilt thou follow Jesus, hear 
His voice alone, though thou must bear thy 
cross daily, and travel in a way so straight, 
so thorny, and so difficult ? Wilt thou do the 
will of God in all things, though thou must re- 
nounce thine own will, which thon lovest above 
all things ? ' Master, goest Thou thither again V " 

Such are the cowardly insinuations of our car- 
nal and unbelieving hearts. What will Jesus 
do ? Will He listen to the voice of His disciples ? 
Will He keep away from Judea ? Ah ! could 
Jesus ever have recoiled from the prospect of 
sacrifices, of conflicts, of pain, of death, would 
He have quitted the abode of glory and happi- 
ness, to lescend into the abyss of our misery? 



THE HEROISM OF JESUS. 109 

Would His eye have ever looked forward to the 
hill of Golgotha? In returning into Judea, He 
did not merely go to Bethany, to accomplish, ra 
the midst of those whom He loved, a work of His 
omnipotence and love, to call Lazarus out of the 
sepulchre, and to restore him to his sisters, and 
to make consolation and joy take the place of 
grief and sorrow in their hearts. This would 
have been a pleasing task to Him ; but in return- 
ing into Judea, Jesus had an infinitely greater 
and more noble object in view ; but also an anti- 
cipation infinitely sad and painful. He had 
before His eyes the principal end of His divine 
mission ; He approaches the week of His suffer- 
ings. The last passover draws near ; the victim 
of expiation, slain before the foundation of the 
world, the hope and expectation of ages, ap- 
proaches the altar. Jesus has before His eyes a 
sinful world, which He has come to save — a 
fallen race, which He would restore to its prime- 
val destination. He sees eternal justice ready to 
strike the guilty ; He wishes to satisfy it. He 
sees a curse ready to fall upon the violators of 
the eternal law of order; He wishes to bear it 
upon His guiltless head. He sees a hell ; He 
wishes to extinguish its flames. He sees an 
eternal happiness ; He wishes to procure it for 
us. He sees a God of infinite love ; He wishes 
to make us the objects of that love. 

Such is the object which Jesus contemplates 
at the termination of His career ; and His ardent 
love is impatient to accomplish it. And yet He 

10 



HO MEDITATION IV. 

knows that He can only attain it through igno- 
miny and pain. When He says, " Let us go 
again into Judea," He knows that He advances 
towards sufferings and death. Already has He 
predicted to His disciples what is about to happen 
to Him : already they have a fearful intimation 
of it. Jesus does not wish to grieve nor dis- 
courage them by telling them more plainly of it. 
Full of a calm and unshaken resolution, He pro- 
ceeds alone to the end which He has in view — 
the redemption of a sinful world. He sees be- 
fore Him reproach, cruel sufferings, an ignomin- 
ious death. He sees before Him the contest 
which is to end only with the last breath of His 
life exhausted through grief, and with the last 
drop of the guiltless blood which flows in His veins. 
He sees near Him the disciple who is to betray 
Him; He sees at a distance the crowds of an 
enraged people, whom His love would save ; He 
hears the cries of their hatred, " Crucify Him ! 
Crucify Him !" He sees Calvary, which He is 
about to tread, bearing the instrument of His 
death and of our salvation. He sees the das- 
tardly flight of those whom He loves. He sees 
the dark hours of a long agony ; He sees death 
and the grave. He still has it in His power to 
put away from Him the bitter cup: He has it in 
His power to retrace His steps. Galilee and 
Samaria, whither He had often retired, because 
His hour was not come, are still ready to receive 
Him, and to afford Him a refuge from the fury 
of His enemies. But no j He hath said, with 



THE HEROISM OF JESUS. Ill 

the calmness and courage of a hero marching to 
victory, " Let us go into Judea again ;" and He 
returns into Judea. And when I consider that 
the object of Jesus is to save a guilty race, to 
save the very people who reject Him, the crimi- 
nals who pat Him to death, and that His gene- 
rous heart, burning with a love unknown on earth, 
is impatient to accomplish the work of their sal- 
vation, I cast myself at the feet of this Redeem- 
er, and exclaim, " Behold courage and devoted- 
ness ! Behold a heroism, before which all human 
actions that have been honoured with this name 
fade away, appear utterly worthless, and are 
confounded in the vile dust of this polluted 
earth !" 

O ! immortal beings, immortal sinners called to 
glory ! if Christ be our Saviour, if we bear the 
name of His disciples, shall we not now awake 
from our cowardly selfishness, and follow the ex- 
ample of our Great Head ? Shall we continually 
find in our hearts and upon our lips, the miserable 
objections of the disciples'? Ah! shall the exam- 
ple of such love, such devotedness as we have 
been the objects of, allow our cold, freezing- 
hearts to remain under the influence of their 
shameful egotism, and of their deplorable insen- 
sibility ? Why should we shrink back with trem- 
bling from that combat, that trial, and those suffer 
ings, to which our Divine Saviour, who has al- 
ready gone before us in the way, call us ! Why, 
when the will of God is known to us, when the 
Lord has spoken, should we be seen vacillating 



Il2 MEDITATION IV. 

without courage at the prospect of some painful 
sacrifice which we are required to make upon the 
altar of Him whom we adore as our Redeemer? 
Ah ! let us remember, that He who redeemed us. 
and whose we are. claims our whole heart, with- 
out reserve : let us remember, that if while we 
desire to follow Him we love father or mother, 
sister or brother, more than Him, we are not wor- 
thy of Him. Let us remember, that His sove- 
reign will must find our head bowed down in the 
dust, and our submissive heart ready to exclaim, 
" It is the Lord ; let Him do what seemeth Him 
good." But let us also remember, that, in tread- 
ing that path, we are not alone ; He who has gone 
before us never leaves us to our own strength, or 
rather to our own weakness, but He guides and 
supports us in it, and leads us on to victory. Let 
our unshaken confidence in Him, in His love, an<? 
in His power, be as an anchor to our soul, both 
sure and steadfast; then let the winds and storms 
rise with fury : we may be shaken, but we can 
never be cast down. 

But if the heroic example of our Captain ap- 
pears too much above us, if the view of that sub- 
lime height terrifies us; if we despair of being 
able of ourselves to tread that sacred mountain in 
His footsteps ; if we find ourselves ready to bring 
forward the objection of the disciples, let us at 
least hear the answer which Jesus condescends to 
make, the encouragement which He deigns to 
give them; and let us, in dependence upon His 
blessing, receive instruction. 



THE TWELVE HOURS OF THE DAY. 113 

"Are there not twelve hours in the day? If 
any man walk in the day, he stumbleth not, be- 
cause he seeth the light of this world. But if a 
man walk in the night, he stumbleth, because 
there is no light in him." Two important lessons 
may be drawn for our encouragement from these 
words. " Are there not twelve hours in the day ?" 
(given us by God to accomplish the task assigned 
to us,) after which " cometh the night when no 
man can work ;" and, if a man " walk in the night 
he stumbleth, because there is no light in him." 
Here is the first serious lesson which the words 
of Jesus teach us ; here the first encouragement 
which they afford us. And from whence, in fact, 
arise that cowardice, that selfishness, that fear of 
sacrifices, and of sufferings, which paralyze our 
energies, and render us incapable of courage, and 
of generous devotion ? It is from this that in pass- 
ing through life, we forget the end of life. It is 
that, thinking only of ourselves, and of the interests 
of the present moment, we forget that we have an 
important task to perform, the results of which, 
happy or miserable, shall reach to all eternity. 
Twelve hours in the day .... Then, " the 
angel which I saw stand upon the sea and upon 
the earth, lifted up his hand to heaven and sware 
by Him that liveth for ever and ever, who created 
heaven and the things thai: therein are, and the 
sea, and the tilings which are therein, that there 
should be time no longer !" Twelve hours in the 
day .... Then " He that shall come will come, 
and will not tarry;" then a voice shall echo from 

10* 



114 MEDITATION IV. 

heaven to earth, and even to the deep abyss of 
hell, and shall surprise the ungodly, as " travail 
cometh upon a woman in labour" — " Give an ac- 
count of thy stewardship !" Twelve hours in the 
day ! Oh ! the folly of multitudes of miserable 
beings, who, though charged with an awful respon- 
sibility, squander away those hours, so few, and so 
precious, in the pursuit of mere vanities ! Shall 
not the Pagan monarch, who commanded his 
slave to repeat to him every morning, with a loud 
voice, " Philip, remember that thou art mortal," 
rise up in judgment at the last day against thou- 
sands who bear the name of a crucified Saviour, 
and yet march towards the tomb as if there were 
no death, no judgment, no eternity ! Forgetting 
their high destination, they follow, during the 
" twelve hours of the day," shadows which deceive 
them and fly from them; a visionary dream ab- 
sorbs their whole attention during those twelve 
hours destined to labour ; and if they awake upon 
a dying bed, in the presence of death, on the brink 
of eternity, when " there is time no longer," how 
bitter is the remembrance of the many hours of 
youth, of riper age, of manhood, which have been 
lost, miserably lost. 

Ah ! is life, which twelve hours measure, so 
long that we can bear to squander away our best 
days in " sowing the wind, to reap the whirlwind ?" 
Does time not fly past us with a sufficient rapidity ? 
Does the hand which measures the brief moments 
of our life on the dial-plate of time move so slowly, 
that we must hasten its fatal progress by dissipa- 



THE TWELVE HOURS OF THE DAY. 115 

t t and folly ? Is there so little of what is seri« 
oi connected with the end of life, that we would 
S| ft in forgetfulness with the deceitful passions 
ot tie heart, or extinguish, amid the tumult of the 
wc Id and of sensual pleasures, the last rays of 
the day which is awarded to us ? Oh ! how de- 
plo. ible is the lot of the deluded mortal who has 
nev r stopped in the rapid career which he is 
pun ling, to ask himself before God, " Why was I 
born V J Soon, like the misguided traveller, who, 
to hi amazement, is arrested in his progress by 
the s v ,ore of the boundless ocean, he shall awake, 
alas ! too late, on the verge of eternity. He 
shunn >.d the light of life during the twelve hours 
of the day, that he might travel without remorse 
in the dark road of perdition ; he has walked in 
the nig it ; he stumble th. Great God ! into what 
an ab} is of darkness and despair is he precipi- 
tated ! 

" Loi-1, teach us to number our days, that we 
may ap^ly our hearts unto wisdom." Thus prayed 
Moses ia the wilderness ; and thus Avill that man 
pray who has not forgotten that he is on his way 
to Canaan ; that the time is short ; that the sun 
has begun to set ; that the night is already spread- 
ing its veil of gloom ; that eternity approaches ; 
that the grave is opening. And shall he who thus 
prays still continue the slave of selfishness? shall 
he at the sight of his task, at the prospect of 
sacrifices, entrench himself like a coward behind 
the objection of the Apostles ? No : we trust not 
The one consideration which Jesus offers to His 



116 MEDITATION IV. 

disciples, the seriousness of life, the shortness of 
time, these terrible words, death, judgment, eter- 
nity, which ring in his ears with a voice of thun- 
der, will banish selfishness and fear from his 
heart, and inspire him with an energy, a courage, 
and an activity, which will urge him to follow the 
Captain of his salvation whom he loves. 

But, is there no happiness in following Him 
who has so beautifully associated example with 
precept ? His earthly life was not of long dura- 
tion ; it was in the flower of His age that " He 
was taken from prison and from judgment, that 
He was cut off out of the land of the living, and 
was stricken for the transgressions of His people." 
But it is not by the number of years, but rather 
by the manner in which they are employed, that 
we should calculate the length of our life ; the 
longest life is lost if we attain not the end of our 
being ; and if we have attained it, an hour is 
worth an eternity. According to this computa- 
tion, oh how long did He live who went about 
doing good! His life was an uninterrupted chain 
of good works, works which had for their object 
the glory of God and the salvation of fallen man 
whom He came to redeem. Every step in His 
divine life is marked by some work of tender 
charity ; every hour is adorned by some act of de- 
votedness, proving the truth of that declaration 
which issued from the lips of Jesus Himself: u My 
meat is to do the w T ill of Him that sent Me, and 
to finish His work." We must repeat it ; the 
glory of His Father, was the constant end of His 



THE TWELVE HOURS OP THE DAY. 117 

life ; the happiness of the immortal souls of His 
brethren, was the means which he adopted for its 
attairrment. 

His days were spent in instructing the ignorant, 
comforting the afflicted, healing the sick, doing 
good to all. His nights were employed in soli- 
tude, and in prayer to His Father for the same 
beings to whom He consecrated His life. The 
morning found Him in the temple, preaching the 
glad tidings of the kingdom to those who were 
still " dwelling in darkness and in the shadow of 
death." After a day of fatigue, the evening 
again found Him lending His ear and opening 
His compassionate heart to the complaint of the 
poor and the miserable. Speak, ye thousands of 
suffering beings who were objects of His glowing 
charity and benevolence ! Speak ; let your voice 
traverse the intervening ages, and let it come to 
instruct us and make us blush for our weakness; 
when did you see Him lose one, even one, of the 
twelve hours of the day? When did you see 
Him reject even one among the multitudes that 
came unto Him ? When did you see Him send 
away the ignorant without instruction : the afflic- 
ted without consolation ; the soul oppressed with 
a sense of its misery, without a word of pardon, 
peace, and love ; the sick without healing ; the 
needy without relief? Ah! you say, never, 
never ! An inimitable succession of acts of the 
noblest, purest, most tender love was exibited be- 
fore your eyes from the hour when a divine voice 
proclaimed to earth, u This is my beloved Son, 



i 1 8 MEDITATION IV. 

hear Him ;" even to that when his expiring voice 
and His triumphant love made earth ring with 
that announcement, repeated by the celestial hosts 
throughout the whole extent of heaven, " It is 
finished. 11 

O my beloved friends, when, after contemplat- 
ing the life of our Saviour, we cast a glance at 
our own, what a contrast do we find ! What 
worthlessness ! what a void ! what nothingness ! 
How many hours lost! how many unprofitable 
days ! how many good works neglected ! how often 
have we put off till to-morrow what might have 
been done to-day ! How many souls which we 
might have attempted to enlighten have remained 
in darkness ! How many afflicted fellow- creatures 
to whom our languishing charity has offered no 
consolation! How many poor with whom our 
selfishness has not allowed us to share our bread ! 
O my God ! shall not these rise up in judgment 
against us in the day of great account? Is it for 
such a Jife that Thou hast given us the twelve 
hours of the day ? Is it for this that Thou hast 
redeemed us? Ah, pardon ! Lord, pardon! En- 
ter not into judgment with Thy servants. We 
could not answer Thee to one charge of a thou- 
sand. 

Meanwhile, Christ condescends to give us also 
another lesson, in the words which we are consid- 
ering — " If any man walk in the day, he stumbleth 
not, because he seeth the light of this world. But 
if a man walk in the night, he stumbleth, because 
there is no light in him" — words which not merely 



THE TWELVE HOUItS OF THE DAY. 119 

imply that we ought, as we have just said, faith- 
fully to employ the. twelve hours of the day for the 
accomplishment of our task, because the night 
cometh when no man can work ; but here Jesus 
evidently spiritualizes the image which He makes 
use of, and intends to teach us that w-e ought to 
perform our task by the light of His word and of 
His will. The conclusion of the passage, " If a 
man walk in the night, he stumbleth, because 
there is no light in him," leaves no doubt as to the 
signification of the words. Christ Jesus Himself 
is " the light of the world." " I," saith He, "am 
the light of the world ; he that followeth Me, 
shall not walk in darkne-ss." All out of Him, all 
that is in the world, all that is in our heart, is only 
darkness and sin. Alas ! what had been our lot, 
had not this " day-spring from on high visited 
us ?" had not this " day star arisen in our hearts?" 
Would w r e have been more happy because our 
age is entitled the age of light? No, all that an 
aspiring philosophy, even the most intellectual, 
can afford us, without the light which shines in 
the gospel of Christ, would be to our souls but as 
the deceitful glimmerings which float over the 
sandy desert, and only delude the misguided tra- 
veller. Human systems are silent when I ask 
them, " What must I do to be saved?" When 
my soul, penetrated w r ith a feeling of the serious- 
ness of life, the importance of my eternal destiny, 
the shortness of the twelve hours of the day, turns 
anxiously to my fellow-travellers, and asks even 
the most enlightened among them, " Where are 



120 MEDITATION IV. 

we? Where are we going? What way ought we 
to take ?" they look amazed ; no hand is stretched 
forth to point out to me the road ; their light shines 
not on the verge of the tomb ; beyond it all is 
darkness ! I am still left wandering in the de- 
sert ; O happiness! a voice is lifted up: it is 
heard in the plains of Judea : it passes over inter- 
vening ages ; it reaches even unto me ; " I am 
the way, the truth, and the life ; no man cometh 
unto the Father but by Me." Happy he who has 
followed this Guide ! Happy he who has walked 
in His light ! In vain gloomy clouds from time 
to time obscure the rays of the Sun of Righteous- 
ness; they disappear ; the heavens become serene, 
and the child of light " stumbleth not, because he 
seeth the light of the world." 

He who has any experience of the christian life, 
can tell what anxiety, what anguish he feels, when 
he knows not the will of God in reference to the 
way in which he ought to act, the road which he 
ought to take, when many open before him, and 
when some degree of darkness encompasses his 
soul. Desirous to fulfil his duty, and to employ in 
the most useful manner the twelve hours of the 
day, he casts himself at the feet of Him who is 
the light; he studies His word ; he prays, : ' Lord, 
what wilt Thou have me to do?" And if a ray 
of divine light penetrates into his soul, if he is in- 
structed on the part which he ought to choose, 
what courage, what strength, what an energy 
does he derive from the assurance tbat he is do- 
ing the will of his God ! He is following his Mas- 



THE TWELVE HOURS Of THE DAY. 121 

ter ; what then can stop his course or abate his 
courage ? What could have ^withheld Jesus from 
going into Judea? He had before Him a family 
to console, a world to save, and in that, the will 
of His Father that sent Him. Ah ! it is this as- 
surance that has caused martyrs to embrace the 
stake or to mount the scaffold ! This assurance, 
when it becomes a living principle in oar soul, 
will make us surmount all obstacles, provided it 
be our sincere desire to fulfil the will of God, and 
our soul acknowledge and adore His sovereignty. 
But if you determine to walk on still in dark- 
ness, in your own ways, in your own wisdom, and 
independently of the supreme will of God, what 
can you expect from your own efforts, your own 
courage, and your best resolutions ? " If any man 
walk in the night, he stumbleth, because there is 
no light in him." Oh ! why are there so many 
unhappy beings who love darkness rather than 
light ? Why do we see them in their folly plung- 
ing deeper into the darkness, whenever a ray of 
,ight shines into their conscience ? However de- 
plorable their folly, there is nothing in it which 
ou^ht to surprise us; the Lord Himself has given 
us in His word, an explanation of this mystery of 
iniquity, " Their deeds are evil." They shun the 
light of truth, as their chief enemy. Shall they 
always be able to shun it? No : the twelve hours 
aave passed away unprofitably ; "the light of this 
world" has disappeared beneath the horizon ; the 
dark valley of the shadow of death presents itself 
to the view of the wretched being who has fled 

11 



122 MEDITATION IV. 

the liglit ; what gleam of brightness shall guide 
his tottering footsteps ? What strength shall sup- 
port him? And while the last spark of life is ex- 
piring in his heart, undeceived, alas! too late, 
what voice shall speak consolation and peace to 
his soul? He has shunned the light. O God! 
what a night envelops his soul ! The Bible calls 
that night, " outer darkness, where there is weep- 
ing, and wailing, and gnashing of teeth." O, un- 
happy mortal! if upon thy death bed there yet 
remain to thee a breath of life, a sigh which thou 
canst breathe into the bosom of thy God, hasten, 
lift up thy dying voice to Jesus ; say, like the 
thief upon the cross, " Lord, remember me, when 
Thou comest into Thy kingdom !" Perhaps a 
last plank of safety may be offered to thee in the 
shipwreck of thy life ; perhaps a last ray of hea- 
ven's light may break into thy troubled soul, and 
make hope revive. 

And let us, immortal and accountable beings, 
for whom the twelfth hour of the day has not yet 
tolled, who still may " walk in the light," oh let 
us, strong in the strength of God, having our eyes 
fixed upon the Author and Finisher of our faith, 
from whom come pardon and life, li and laying 
aside every weight, and the sin which so easily 
besets us, run the race which is set before us." 
And that we may be enabled to imitate our Mas- 
ter in His courage and devotedness, while looking 
to His example let us also write upon our hearts 
the two great lessons which He presents to our 
consideration, as well as to that of His disciples — 



THE TWELVE HOURS OF THE LAY. ■'& 

the importance of life, which He calls " the twtive 
hours of the day" and the necessity of fulfilling our 
duly by the light of the sovereign will of our God. 
And then we shall see the strength of God made 
perfect in our weakness j we shall see selfishness 
giving way to devotedness, that we may follow 
the Lamb whithersoever He goeth : a new love 
will take possession of our soul, and give us a 
powerful support. In fine, we shall see the fulfil- 
ment of this gracious promise of the Lord, " I will 
cause thee to ride on the high places of the earth ;" 
'• Therefore the redeemed of the Lord shall re- 
turn, and come with singing unto Zion, and ever- 
lasting joy shall be upon their heads; they shall 
obtain gladness and joy, and sorrow and mourn- 
ing shall flee away," 



MEDITATION V. 

« OUR FRIEND LAZARUS SLEEPETH." 



John xl 11, 



* These things said He : and after that He saith unto them, Our 
friend Lazarus sleepeth; but I go, that I may awake him out of 
sleep." 

It was not a system of morality, nor of philo- 
sophy, that Jesus came to communicate to this 
world. It was something widely different that 
man had need of. A transgressor of the law of 
his God, he is not only the object of the divine 
indignation and wrath, but he has also become 
the miserable slave of corruption and sin, and that 
sin produces in time, as well as in eternity, the 
bitterest fruits. In this state, while eternal misery 
is allotted to his soul as its final portion, a gloomy 
abode of dissolution, amid the ruins of death, is 
assigned to his mortal body as its last dwelling- 
place. Yes, death ; that unfathomable abyss, that 
enigma which baffles all philosophy — death, which 
an inspired writer calls "the king of terrors" — 
death, preceded by agonies and sufferings, takes 
possession of one part of this sinful being, and ad- 



OUR FRIEND LAZARUS SLEEPETH. 125 

monishes him that that which is immortal in him 
must appear before the tribunal of a righteous 
Judge. 

Now the doctrine of Jesus, to which He has 
given the title of u glad tidings," not merely pro- 
claims pardon to him whom it addresses ; not 
merely cancels the sentence of punishment de- 
manded by a violated law ; but even mitigates 
and divests of their terrors the most formidable 
and bitter consequences of sin in time. The Gos- 
pel, in proclaiming pardon to the guilty, in break- 
ing with power the ignominious chains of his sla- 
very, deprives death of its sting, the tomb of its 
darkness, the grave of its victory. The Redeemei 
thus leads him, whom He has rescued, to the lofty 
heights of liberty, from whence he can look down 
in triumph on the scene of desolation and ruin, 
where sin commits its fearful ravages, and where 
formerly he had cried, " O wretched man that I 
am, who shall deliver me from the body of this 
death?" And from this lofty eminence the re- 
deemed of Christ, triumphant and yet humbled, 
begin this song of victory, u We are more than 
conquerors through Him that loved us." It is 
thus that Jesus would have us contemplate life 
and death ; and it is for this reason, that in telling 
His disciples that he whom He calls His friend 
had ceased to live upon this earth ; He does not 
speak of death, or of destruction, or of the king 
of terrors, although that friend of Jesus, like all 
other men, had gone down into the grave. No ; 
it is a rest which succeeds labour, a sleep which 

11* 



126 MEDITATION V. 

follows fatigue; " Our friend Lazarus sleepeth; 
but I go, that I may awake him out of sleep." 

O Jesus ! Prince of Life ! Sovereign Ruler of 
ail things ! come w T hile we meditate upon the 
words of eternal life which Thou hast brought us 
from heaven, come and speak also to our souls, of 
rest, and peace, and victory ! Raise up our minds 
above time, above this life of misery, above death, 
above the grave ! Enable us to follow Thee to 
those sublime heights whither Thou hast directed 
our eternal hopes ! Break the chains that still 
bind us to earth, to corruption, and to death, and 
give us fully to enjoy the glorious liberty of the 
children of God. 

Jesus had silenced, by a very serious reproof, 
the objection which His disciples had made to His 
going into Judea. He might have answered 
them at once, " Lazarus is dead, and I go to bring 
relief to his afflicted sisters." But no ; He wishes 
to prepare them for this afflicting intelligence ; 
He wishes even to communicate it to them in 
terms that might sweeten air its bitterness ; " Our 
friend Lazarus sleepeth ;" and then, as if He had 
already said too much for the heart of His disci- 
ples, who also loved Lazarus, He hastens to add, 
as it were to place the remedy beside the evil, the 
consolation beside the trial, " But I go, that I may 
awake him out of sleep." As Jesus knew all 
that had passed at Bethany, without receiving any 
further intelligence ; as He had seen the whole 
progress of the disease of Lazarus, and all the 
affliction of his sisters, He could have healed him 



OUR FRIEND LAZARUS SLEEPETH. 127 

of his malady ; or supposing him to have died. 
He could have restored him to life again at a dis- 
tance as well as at hand, by pronouncing one word 
of that power which was given Him in heaven 
and in earth. But let us not forget that this sick- 
ness was " for the glory of God, and that the Son 
of God might be glorified." Jesus rejoices for 
His disciples' sake, that He was not there ; He 
turns towards Judea ; and there, on the verge of 
the tomb, must all Israel, and all future genera- 
tions, admire the power of the Redeemer of the 
wor^d, "But I go, that I may awake him out of 
sleep." Happy the disciples of such a Master ! 
Happy they who were witnesses of his power ! 
still happier they who know, by their own experi- 
ence, that His love is in nothing inferior to His 
power ! 

But who can sufficiently feel, or appreciate in a 
suitable manner, the happiness of the man whom 
Jesus calls His friend ? He who " made the 
world," He who " upholdeth all things by the 
word of His power," the Lord of glory gives to a 
worm of the earth, a sinner, the title of friend ! 
A poor mortal, one of those who are called the 
great ones of this world, though they be but dust 
and ashes, would not deign to give that title to a 
fellow-man, if he were in the least his inferior, 
yet he whom angels worship gives it to Lazarus ! 
Alas ! a miserable, sinful being, filled with a sense 
of his own nothingness before the " God-man," he 
would never have dared to assume such a title to 
himself: Nit Jesus gave it to him ; Jesus carried His 



.28 MEDITATION V. 

condescension, or rather His love, beyond all his 
expectations; Jesus called him His friend, ijow 
precious, how encouraging, is this name in the 
heart and in the mouth of the Redeemer ol this 
world ! His heart, as well as His lips, pronounced 
it ; for He whose name is the " True " knows not, 
or scorns the deceitful language of a hypocritical 
world, which has ever the expressions of the noblest 
sentiments upon its lips, while its selfish heart 
remains a stranger to devotedness and love. It 
is too well known what value the title of friend 
has in the world ; it makes a part of the dialect of 
fashion ; it is given to every body; it is used as a 
mask which is worn as long as it serves men's 
interests, and then is thrown aside when the wind 
of circumstances has changed its direction. Where 
are those friends that can pardon a fault in their 
friend? Where are those who will acknowledge 
a friend in adversity? This, though a trite ob- 
servation, is one that cannot be too frequently 
repeated, to the shame of every man who has not 
learned friendship in the school of Christ We 
see around the man who is basking in prosperity, 
and loaded withriches and honours, a crowd of those 
pretended friends, who have always the name up- 
on their lips. A few days have sufficed to plunge 
this man, thus flattered while at the summit of 
opulence and power, into the depth of misery. In- 
stead of occupying an honourable place, instead of 
being sought after in the society of the gieat, he 
suffers perhaps in an humble dwelling, laid upon a 
bed of pain, deprived of every thing thai could 



OUR FRIEND LAZARUS SLEEPEfH. 129 

sweeten the bitterness of his situation. Where , 
now, are those false and cruel parasites, who lately 
surrounded him and loaded him with hypocritical 
demonstrations of their attachment? I see none 
of them around him. He is poor; this is a suffi- 
cient reason for their being ashamed to own him 
as their friend j he is unfortunate, this is his crime. 
Oh ye, whose hearts have been lacerated by a 
sad experience of the instability of human affec- 
tions, and of the cruelty of your fellow-men! ye 
suffering and unhappy beings, whom a proud 
world knows not and rejects, come to Jesus, He 
will be your friend ! Expect not from men the 
consolation and peace which you long after. He 
who trusts in the arm of flesh, rests upon a broken 
reed, " whereon, if a man lean, it will go into his 
hand arid pierce it." What will you find in hu- 
man affections that can fill the void of your soul, 
answer a single sigh of your heart, dry a single 
tear? Ah! if hitherto you have not dared to call 
Jesus your friend, see, He Himself anticipates 
you ; He Himself gives you that title, so dear to 
an affectionate heart, and with that title He also 
gives you all the privileges of a friend. Let not 
the feeling of your unworthiness, of your sins, of 
your frailty, terrify you, or drive you away from 
Him ! " He came to seek and to save that which 
was lost." He was no* offended at being called 
" the friend of publicans and sinners." Neither 
let your poverty, your nakedness, the meanness of 
your condition, affright you. He it is " who 
though He was rich, yet for your sakes became 



130 MEDITATION V. 

poor, that ye through His poverty might be 
rich." 

Unlike your worldly patrons, who call them- 
selves friends, but whom you cannot approach 
without trembling, amid the display of luxury, 
magnificence, and pride, with which they are 
surrounded, Jesus, who is willing to be your 
powerful friend, was born in a manger ; a few 
poor fishermen, from the borders of the lake of 
Gennesaret, composed His entire retinue : the 
sick, w»hom He healed ; the poor, whom He 
relieved ; the unhappy, whom He comforted, 
were His whole society. Unlike, too, the worldly 
friends, who love only as long as they find it their 
interest or their pleasure, Jesus is always the 
same, always ready to bless. His love requires 
nothing of you but your heart; He only wishes 
to give, never to receive. The more unhappy 
and suffering, the more humble and contrite you 
are, the more will He be pleased to call you 
friends. In His love all is gratuitous, all is free 
all is gift. Again I repeat it, come to Jesus 
open your heart to Him, call Him your friend 
He Himself invites you to do so ; He Himself 
urges you to come and draw out of the pure and 
inexhaustible source which He has opened in His 
infinite love. " Ho, every one that thirsteth, 
come ye to the waters!" a Come unto Me, all ye 
that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give 
you rest, and ye shall find rest unto your souls." 

" Our friend Lazarus sleepeth " Jesus does 
not say, my friend ; He does not wish to exclude 



OUR FRIEN'D LAZAEJJS SLEEPETH. 131 

His disciples from that sacred friendship : the\ 
also love Lazarus. He who is the friend of Jesus, 
is also the friend of all those whom He loves. 
That maxim of the world, then, is false, selfish, 
and I had almost said, insulting to the human 
heart, " that a man can have but one real friend." 
It shows more than any thing we could say, what 
friendship is in the estimation of the world, and 
what are all attachments of which the love of 
Jesus does not form the bond. Far from us be 
that selfishness of a narrow heart. If Jesus be 
our friend, all those whom He loves are our real 
friends. " See how these Christians love one 
another," exclaimed the astonished Pagans, when 
they beheld the spectacle, unknown before to the 
world, which the members of the primitive Church 
presented to their view. Their is an invisible but 
powerful chain, uniting in Jesus all those who 
have in their heart a spark of love for Him. All 
the people of Christ, from Abel to the last be- 
liever that shall be found in this world, from 
those new brethren who in distant heathen lands 
surrender their hearts to Jesus, even to those re- 
deemed ones around us whom we love, and to those 
who, having reached perfection, offer up their 
prayers at the foot of the throne of God, for their 
companions in salvation, still fighting here below; 
all, all form one people — the friends of Jesus ; all 
strive together, by their prayers, all walk together 
towards Zion, towards " the general assembly 
and church of the first-born," towards the centre 
of eternal love, which soon will reunite them all. 



132 MEDITATION 

Let us hear the history of David in his trials. 
u Now it came to pass when David had made an 
end of speaking unto Saul, that the soul of Jon 
athan was knit with the soul of David, and 
Jonathan loved him as his own soul. Then 
Jonathan and David made a covenant, because 
he loved him as his own soul. And they kissed 
one another, and wept one with another, until 
David exceeded. And Jonathan said to David, 
Go in peace, forasmuch as we have sworn both 
of us in the name of the Lord, saying, the Lord 
be between me and thee, and between my seed 
and thy seed, for ever. If it please my father tc 
do thee evil, then will I show it thee, that thou 
mayest go in peace, and the Lord be with thee, 
as he hath been with my father." (1 Sarn. xviii. 
and xx.) Let us hear the history of the primitive 
Church. " And the multitude of them that 
believed were of one heart and of one soul: 
neither said any of them, that aught of the things 
which he possessed was his own ; but they had 
all things common." One of the pillars of 
that Church, the Apostle Peter, is cast into prison 
by Herod ; the following day he is to be brought 
forth to suffer the punishment which the tyrant 
has decreed ; but while Peter is kept in prison, 
" prayer is made without ceasing of the Church 
unto God for him." And a messenger from the 
Most High breaks his chains, and gives him to 
the believing prayers of his brethren ! The 
Apostle Paul is brought to Rome, as a prisoner, 
for the name of Jesus. After having suffered a 



OUR FRIEND LAZARUS SLEEPETH. 133 

shipwreck, which put his life in jeopardy, he 
arrives; he is is oppressed with the fatigues of so 
painful a voyage, and with the weight of the 
chains which he bears for Jesus his Saviour. 
" And when the brethren heard of us," says the 
divine historian of the Acts, " they came to meet 
us as far as Appii Forum, and the Three Tav- 
erns: whom when Paul saw" (though, perhaps, 
he was not personally acquainted with one of 
them,) "he thanked God, and took courage." 

O christian traveller, thou, who, perhaps, under 
the weight of thy trial, groanest by reason of the 
fatigues of thine earthly pilgrimage, take courage 
also, like St. Paul! Thou walkest not alone in 
that path of sorrow, thou hast been preceded by 
thousands of the friends of Jesus who are also thy 
friends, and who, perhaps, like thee, have suffered 
on the road, and have been purified beneath the 
burning heat of the day, that they might be made 
meet to see the face of Him who loved them ; and 
thou art accompanied and followed by thousands 
who, like thee, take up their cross daily, and follow 
Jesus. All love thee ; thou art their friend and 
their brother, if thou belongest by adoption, to 
the family of God. In the moment of contest, 
when thou imaginest that thou art alone, aban- 
doned to thine own weakness, a multitude of thy 
brethren around thee, or in some distant country, 
take a part in thy sorrows, send up their prayers 
to heaven on thy behalf, and call down consola- 
tion and assistance for thine afflicted soul. 
Jesus \ what happiness it is to be Thy friend, to 

12 



134 MEDITATION V. 

have a part in that kingdom of peace and love 
which Thou has come to establish upon earth ! 
Thy kingdom come ! 

" Our friend Lazarus Sveepeth." Such, to the 
friends of Jesus, is the termination of their journey ! 
To them it is no longer that frightful death, with 
its gloomy retinue of agonies and fears ; it is not 
that " king of terrors," who announces his ap- 
proach to the unpardoned sinner, with the voice 
of thunder echoing through the inmost recesses of 
a conscience, awaking, alas ! too late, to remorse 
and despair. It is not that gloomy sepulchre in 
which all the projects, the joys, and the hopes of 
the ungodly are swallowed up for ever. It is not 
that dark and fearful eternity, in comparison of 
which, annihilation itself, with all its horrors, 
would be desirable. No, it is a calm sleep, sue- 
ceeding the long and painful watchings of life ; it 
is the rest which follows the fatigues of a journey, 
The friend of Jesus sleeps ; he does not die. " She 
is not dead," said Jesus, on entering a house where 
the pious inmates were weeping for the departure of 
an only daughter, " She is not dead, but sleepeth !" 
— sweet figure, with which Jesus, after having 
destroyed the sting, envelops the terrors of death. 
Like the infant that reposes with confidence in its 
mother's bosom, the friend of Jesus sleeps in the 
arms of a tender and merciful Father, until at the 
sound of the last trumpet, calling him to the life 
of heaven, he awakes on the morning of that eter- 
nal day of happiness which Jesus has procured for 
him. 



OUR FRIEND LAZARUS SLEEPETH. 135 

" Our friend Lazarus sleepeth I" Alas ! the 
earthly pilgrimage of the friend of Jesus may not 
have been less painful than that of other men. 
Often, perhaps, he may have been on the point of 
straying into the crooked paths of the world, or of 
sinking under the pressure of fatigue. Often he 
may have traversed thorny places which tore his 
tottering feet. He may have had to clamber 
up many a lofty mountain, to travel through many 
a deep valley. His heaviest burden, the burden 
of sin and corruption, may frequently have seemed 
ready to overwhelm him, and may have filled his 
heart with bitterness, while he pursued his soli- 
tary way through the dry places of the wilder- 
ness. Often, too, leaning his weary head upon 
his hand, he may have cried, like another travel- 
ler to the heavenly Zion, " My tears have been 
my meat day and night. O my God ! my soul is 
cast down wi'hin me; deep calleth unto deep at 
the noise of Thy waterspouts ; all Thy waves 
and Thy billows have gone over me." But at 
the same time he has carried in his breast a hope 
which maketh not ashamed ; he has seen before 
him a better country of which he never lost sight 
and which, though it had been forgotten by all the 
world beside, would have been the sole object of 
his wishes. 

Like Israel, when a captive in Babylon, his 
eyes were turned towards Zion. " If I forget thee, 
O Jerusalem, let my right hand forget her cun- 
ning ; if I do not remember thee, let my tongue 
cleave to the roof of my mouth : if I prefer not 



136 MEDITATION V. 

Jerusalem to my chief joy." And with this hope, 
this friend of Jesus, in travelling to the heavenly 
Jerusalem, was not alone abandoned to his owr 
weakness. His celestial Friend, omnipotent 
though invisible, guided his footsteps, filled his 
heart with fresh courage, eased him of his oppres- 
sive burden, telling him with love, '"Son, be of 
good cheer, thy sins* are forgiven thee !" He 
reaches the end of his course ; his last combat is 
the most painful, but he receives new strength ; 
he can repeat with the Psalmist, to the praise of 
his Almighty Redeemer, " Though I walk through 
the valley of the shadow of death, T will fear no 
evil: for Thou art with me; Thy rod and Thy 
staff they comfort me." Night draws on, dark- 
ness surrounds him, but already he perceives dis- 
tinctly the dawn of a new day. At last he reaches 
the termination of his fatigues and labours ; he 
falls asleep — when he awakes he shall behold 
"the new heavens and the new earth, wherein 
dwelleth righteousness." " And God shall wipe 
away all tears from his eyes ; and there shall be 
no more death, neither sorrow, nor crying, neither 
shall there be any more pain, for the former things 
have passed away." 

Yes, K the former things are passed away." 
This burden of an existence, which sin has 
poisoned with its venom ; this chain of corruption 
and mortality, which binds our soul, and prevents 
it from taking its flight towards its eternal desti- 
nation, is for ever laid aside. There remains of 
all the evils of life nothing but a sweet remem- 



OUR FRIEND LAZaRUS SLEEPETH. 137 

brance, the source of eternal gratitude for the 
wisdom and love of God's dealings, which now, 
for the first time, are fully understood. All the 
rest has passed away like the painful visions of 
the night when one awakes in the morning of a 
beautiful day. All is for ever lost in the element 
of God's eternal love, " in whose presence there 
is fulness of joy." Oh ! to Him who " has over- 
come for us," to the Lamb which was slain, and 
w T hich hath redeemed us out of every nation, and 
kindred, and people, be honour, and glory, and 
praise, for ever and ever! Yes, Jesus, glory to 
Thee ! glory to Thee ! because Thou hast im- 
parted to our hearts such glorious hopes ! because 
at Thy word the lamentations of the unhappy are 
changed into songs of thanksgiving ! because at 
Thy presence the terrors of the grave are changed 
into a feeling of ineffable and eternal felicity. 

My beloved friends, I would have wished to 
terminate this meditation here. But (shall I say 
it ?) an involuntary feeling of fear passes painfully 
across my mind amid the pleasing thoughts which 
have just been occupying us. I fear lest these 
eternal realities, of which Jesus Himself speaks to 
us in our beautiful text, may be to many of you 
but the dream of an imagination, which loves to 
walk in smiling fields, or, in other words, nothing 
but religious poetry. I fear lest, though your soul 
be not entirely insensible to the voice of the 
Saviour^ you should confine yourselves merely to 
a barren admiration of the doctrine which He has 
communicated to mankind. In a word, I ferr, 

12* 



138 MEDITATION. 

lest your heart should remain unchanged, far off 
from God, destitute of His love. Ah ! If it be so 
with any among you, we must conclude that you 
are not the friends of Jesus. Strangers to the life 
of God, and to the regeneration of the Holy Spirit, 
Jesus could not say of you, after death, " Our 
friend sleepeth /" Your end would not be a sleep ; 
it would be death, the destruction of this mortal 
body, followed by what the Bible calls " the second 
death." Oh ! while Jesus yet comes to you as a 
friend and Saviour, not as a judge, hasten to be- 
lieve in His word, His promises, His love ! To- 
morrow, perhaps, you may no longer be able to 
do it. " Now is the accepted time, now is the 
day of salvation." If Jesus be your Saviour during 
life, He will be your friend in the hour of death. 
God grant that you may have such a friend ! God 
grant that the dear objects of your affection, who 
shall weep your departure, may be able to write 
upon your tomb in the name of Jesus, and look- 
ing forward with joy to His second and glorious 
appearing : " Dur friend Lazarus sleepeth, but I 
go, that I may awake him out of sleep." 



MEDITATION VI. 

THE FEAR OF DEATH.— DISTASTE FOR LIFE 



John xi. 12 — 16. 

" Then said His disciples, Lord, if he sleep, he shall do well. How- 
beit Jesus spake of his death : but they thought that He had spo- 
ken of taking of rest in sleep. Then said Jesus unto them plainly 
Lazarus is dead. And I am glad for your sakes that I was not 
there, to the intent ye may believe ; nevertheless, let us go unto 
him. Then said Thomas, which is called Didymus, unto his fellow- 
disciples, Let us also go, that we may die with him." 

There is, in all the details of the history which 
we have been for some time considering, some- 
thing touching, which it is easier to feel than to 
express. Every word that Jesus utters awakens 
in the soul a feeling as delicate as it is deep, which 
delightfully moves it, and constrains us to say, 
" Never man spake like this man." And we are 
compelled to add, u Never historian described like 
the Apostle John." Jesus, driven by persecution 
beyond Jordan, receives the sad intelligence that 
Lazarus, whom He loves, is sick. There is some- 
thing peculiarly distressing in hearing of the sick- 
ness or sufferings of those whom we love, when 
we are absent from them. Jesus also would ap- 



140 MEDITATION VI. 

pear to have experienced this feeling of our hu- 
man nature ; He hastens to silence the apprehen- 
sions of His disciples, and of the messengers whom 
the sisters of Lazarus had sent. " This sickness," 
said He, " is not unto death, but for the glory of 
God. 7 ' He wishes to go back to Judea, and bring 
to the objects of His affection, the aid of His om- 
nipotence and love. His disciples remind Him of 
the hatred of the Jews, and of the danger of ex- 
posing Himself again to those who had lately 
sought to stone Him. Jesus graciously encour- 
ages them, by the solemn consideration of the 
shortness of time, those " twelve hours of the day," 
which fly past with such rapidity: we must walk 
in the light ; " He that walketh in the night stum- 
bleth." And the better still to persuade them that 
He must go into Judea, He tells them that Laza- 
rus has sunk under his painful malady : that his 
eyes are closed to the light. But in telling them, 
instead of using language which would recall to 
their minds the melancholy thought of separation, 
of death, and of the grave, He clothes this sad in- 
telligence with the most pleasing of images, as 
we have seen in our last meditation. " Our friend 
Lazarus," saith He, " sleepeth." And as if He 
feared lest the words which He had spoken should 
have grieved the hearts of His disciples, who loved 
Lazarus, He hastens affectionately to add, "But 
I go to awake him out of sleep." His disciples. 
however, understood Him not: they imagine, as 
our text tells us, that He speaks of a natural sleep, 
and they cherish the hope of a speedy recovery 



THE FEAR OF DEATH. 141 

" Lord," say they, "if he sleep, he shall do well." 
It now becomes necessary for Jesus to undeceive 
them, and to communicate to them the melancholy 
news ; but scarcely have the words, " Lazarus is 
dead," escaped His lips, when He hastens to add. 
with a soothing calmness, " I am glad, for your 
sakes, that I was not there, to the intent ye may 
believe ; nevertheless, let us go unto him." What 
language ! What love ! What a kind Master ! 
Lord, teach us to feel ; above all things, teach us 
to love, that we may be able to comprehend the 
ineffable consolation of the words which proceed 
out of Thy mouth ! 

Yet, notwithstanding this love of Jesus, not- 
withstanding the tender care which He takes to 
instruct and encourage His disciples, we find in 
them nothing but ignorance and weakness ; so 
true is it that " the natural man receiveth not the 
things of the Spirit of God," so difficult is it for 
him to rise above this earth ! The expression of 
the disciples, '" If he sleep, he shall do well," tes- 
tifies the affectionate interest which they took in 
Lazarus. Doubtless they gladly indulge in the 
thought that he shall soon see the termination of 
his sufferings, since, from the words of Jesus, 
which indeed they misunderstood, they imagine 
that he enjoys a restoring sleep. But also, in 
what a light do these words exhibit those men, 
who so seldom were able to rise so as to compre- 
hend their Master's thoughts, and who so fre- 
quently interpreted, in a gross and carnal manner, 
what He spoke with such delicacy and love, that 



142 MEDITATION VI. 

He might not wound their hearts ! It was, per- 
haps, one of the greatest trials of the life of Jesus 
— a trial which He experienced every day — that 
He enjoyed no other society than that of men 
whose gross and ignorant minds continually re- 
verted to the earth (notwithstanding His efforts to 
instruct them,) and who gave Him no compensa- 
tion for His labours. But yet, He had chosen 
them as " vessels of mercy," and He who con- 
sented to stoop so low that He had not a place 
where to lay His head, humbled Himself also, so 
that He had not a heart on which to repose His 
heart. 

What a lesson to us is this self-denial of Jesus, 
this patience with men, who, though they had fol- 
lowed Him, and heard His instructions, for more 
than three years, yet found it difficult to seize His 
simplest thoughts. What do we poor and miser- 
able creatures feel, when those around us are in- 
capable of understanding us? What do we feel 
when we imagine that we are not understood ever 
by our nearest relations, by members of our fam- 
ilies, or by those whom we love ? Alas ! often 
impatience, always grief, seldom sufficient love, to 
endeavour, like Jesus, to make ourselves under- 
stood in another manner, to bring ourselves down 
to the comprehension of others, to make them feel 
that we love them, and that their heart, at least, 
can understand us, if their intellect does not. 
What grievous heart- burnings, what bitter dissen- 
sions, what animosity, perhaps, and hatred, would 
be spared to the world, if we acted towards out 



THE FEAR OF DEATH. 143 

relatives as Jesus did towards His disciples! 
How different from what they are would they he, 
who. hy their calling or their influence, have the 
charge of instructing others, did they conform to- 
me example of that Divine Teacher ! In what- 
ever point of view we contemplate His character, 
it is calculated to cover us with humiliation and 
shame, u To us, O Lord, helongeth confusion of 
face." 

But there is a still more important lesson to be 
drawn from the words of the disciples. They had 
lately opposed our Lord's intention of going into 
Judea, and that because they had already a vague 
and painful presentiment of the sufferings and 
death which there awaited Him, and to which, 
perhaps, they themselves might be exposed. Je- 
sus had previously given them intimation of these 
things ; and this same thought, this same fear, 
gleams through their last words: " If he sleep he 
shall do well," and if he " do well," they seem to 
say to Jesus, " Why go into Judea? Why go and 
expose Thyself to the hatred of the Jews, who so 
short a time ago sought to stone Thee V- Thus 
the serious lesson which Jesus gave them upon the 
necessity of courageously employing the u twelve 
hours of the day " without shrinking back from 
sacrifices, pain, or even death, had no effect upon 
their hearts, "slow" as they were tc to believe,' 
We find them again with the same fears and the 
same weaknesses. They see before them sacrifi- 
ces, pain, and perhaps death with all its terrors. 
This is sufficient to prostrate their courage, to 



144 MEDITATION VI. 

weigh down their hearts, and to render them in 
capable of energy and devotedness. Ah ! how 
clearly do we recognise the work of sin in that 
death which inspires us with so much dread, be- 
cause darkness, and pain, and destruction march 
before it ! Yes, it is sin that has impressed upon 
death that image of fearfulness and terror; it is 
sin that has engraven in such sombre characters 
upon his livid brow, " The wages of sin is death." 
But how weak must faith have been in the 
heart of the disciples, since they were the slaves 
of such a fear, though led on by the Prince of 
Life, who has power over death and the grave 
who is " the resurrection and the life !" What 
their thoughts could not rise above the earth 
above life and death, and yet He who guides, en- 
courages, consoles them, is that Divine Saviour, 
to whom " all power is given both in heaven and 
in earth," and who hath deprived death of its 
sting, the grave of its victory, eternity of its ter- 
rors. Their terror-stricken soul is inaccessible to 
His consolation, because their thoughts are nc 
longer concentrated in His instructions. From the 
time that Jesus crossed the Jordan to return into 
Judea, their heart is filled with fear, and perhaps 
with deep regret, at seeing Him go forward in the 
face of sufTe rings and death. Hitherto they had 
hoped to see His mission upon earth terminate in 
a triumphant manner in the eyes of men, and 
they had calculated upon participating in His glo- 
ry. They are ready again to cry like Peter, when 
he heard his Master predict His sufferings and 



THE FEA.t OF DEATH. 145 







death, " Be it far from Thee, Lord : this shall not 
be unto Thee !" Their dream of an earthly king- 
dom, to be founded by Jesus, has vanished, and 
with it their most brilliant hopes. Their fear of 
suffering and death prevents them from entering 
into the real meaning of the words of Jesus; they 
are altogether engaged with other thoughts; the 
word of the Lord can only be understood in the 
calm of meditation, of confidence, and of faith. 

Alas ! here again we have no right to blame 
the disciples ; They are but too faithful interpre- 
ters of what passes within ourselves. Do we not 
continually feel in our own hearts the weaknesses 
and corruptions which Jesus had to combat in his 
disciples ? How often has the anticipation of some 
trial or suffering made our soul shudder so that 
we have become deaf to the most powerful words 
of the Lord, and inaccessible to his most ineffa- 
ble consolations ? This is, perhaps, the most 
dangerous quicksand which the Christian has to 
fear in his temptations. Instead of bowing down 
to the dust in adoration, under the hand of Him 
that smites us, and inquiring, with the submission 
of a dutiful child, u Lord, what wilt thou have me 
to do ?" we weary and perplex ourselves beyond 
measure ; our inflexible heart rebounds under the 
strokes which are inflicted upon it ; and amid 
those tumultuous emotions, how can we hear that 
voice which addresses us as dear children, "My 
son, despise not thou the chastening of the Lord, 
nor faint when thou art rebuked of Him?" The 
same causes, unbelief and distrust, which fill the 

13 



146 MEDITATION VI. 

soul with trouble in trials, fill it with terror and 
anguish at the approach of death. O my breth- 
ren, were an angel of God to come down this 
moment into this assembly, and to announce to you, 
on the part of the Most High, that this day should 
be your last, that to-morrow your eyes should no 
more open to behold the light, that your body 
should be a lifeless corpse, that your soul should 
have passed into eternity ; — -I ask you, what would 
you feel ? Would you not feel anguish and terror, 
regret and fear, alternately agitating your breasts ? 
Probably most of you, in the agony of your heart, 
answer, Yes. what then must you conclude ? 
Alas that your faith is still without power, your 
love cold and lifeless; that the Divine Saviour 
whom you profess to love, and whom you come to 
worship in His house, is not every thing to you : 
that the earth has attractions for you more power- 
ful than His love ; That you have not yet " pas- 
sed from death unto life," and that the Spirit of 
adoption has not yet taught you to cry, " Abba, 
Father." 

Ah! if you were disciples of Christ; if you had 
found in Jesus a Saviour for your soul ; if He had 
revealed to your still fearful heart the awful mys- 
tery of life and death ; if you felt that you were 
redeemed by His blood from all your sins and 
from the bondage of sin ; if you could see in that 
eternity, the very name of which affrights you, an 
eternity of happiness, because an eternity of love, 
in the presence of Him who hath so loved you ; 
what would you have t fear? Does the unhap- 



THE FEAR OF TEATH. 147 

py exile, who has groaned for years in a land of 
banishment, from whence he has often looked with 
sighs towards his native shores, where the objects 
of his tenderest affections dwell, fear to behold the 
arrival of the moment when he shall be allowed 
to pass over the distance which separates him from 
all that is dear to him, and enter once more into 
the house of a beloved parent, there to press to his 
heart palpitating with joy, those whose absence 
has made him shed so many tears? And would 
you, u strangers and pilgrims" upon earth, fear to 
cross the barrier which separates time from eter- 
nity ? Would you fear to behold in a better country 
that tender Heavenly Father, who so loved you, 
— that merciful Saviour, so worthy of all your af- 
fection, who redeemed you with the price of His 
blood ; who was pleased to become your brother, 
your friend, your sacrifice % Would you fear to 
enter into that place where all who had a heart 
to love the same Divine Saviour shall meet to- 
gether ; and where those who were partakers of 
the like precious faith, and shared with you in 
your combats, your hopes and fears, in this world, 
shall taste with you the delights of the same love 
throughout eternity? Would you fear to lay aside 
the chains of corruption which you still painfully 
drag after you, to be put in full possession of the 
glorious liberty of the children of God, in that land 
of everlasting rest, where there is no more pain, 
nor sorrow, nor separation, nor death, because 
there is no more sin ? No, no ! Christ, Christ is 
my life, and death to me is gain. 



1 48 MEDITATION VI. 

The disciples understood not Jesus: He must 
therefore speak to them with still more patience, 
still more plainness ; he must tell them why He 
wishes to return into Judea, notwithstanding their 
fears. " Therefore, said Jesus unto them plainly. 
Lazarus is dead !" At these words the heart of 
the disciples, already dejected, is overwhelmed 
with sorrow. That word, death, which Jesus 
pronounced unwillingly ; these gloomy ideas of 
separation, the grave, and dissolution, present 
themselves to their minds, and fill them with the 
deepest affliction. Lazarus, whom they loved, 
the friend of Jesus and their friend, is no more ! 
They shall no more go to receive, under his hos- 
pitable roof, the entertainment of his cordial 
friendship! His house shall no longer be an 
asylum for them and their Master ! They shall 
no more retire with Jesus to Bethany, to avoid the 
persecution of His enemies ! All these melan- 
choly reflections rush at once upon the mind of 
the disciples. And you, my friends, who, like the 
disciples, have seen some beloved Lazarus, some 
friend or relative, to whom your soul was closely 
united, die and go down to the grave, — you know 
with what grief such thoughts have filled your 
hearts : you know what an immense void, what a 
solitary desert, such a bereavement has left within 
you : you know with what eagerness your soul 
would have followed, into another world, the be- 
loved being whom death had transported thither, 
when you have felt that involuntary shudder 
which has crept over you, at the thought of a 



THE FEAR OF DEATH. 149 

separation without return upon earth. Well, then, 
disciples of Jesus, you who weep over Lazarus, 
hear your Master, near the Prince of Life speak- 
ing of death, and rejoice with Him, or, at least 
take courage : " I am glad," says Jesus, " for your 
sakes, that I was not there, to the intent ye may 
believe." What a way to give comfort, my breth- 
ren! " I am glad!" and that in speaking of the 
death of one whom He loved! Will not those 
who, in their trials, look for succour from the mis- 
erable comforters of the world, regard such a 
word of consolation as a bitter and cruel irony? 
But how often, when some poor mortal, ignorant 
of God's dealings with him, is weeping and 
mourning over the afflictive events of this life, 
which he cannot understand, does Jesus, who 
watches over His child, whom He desires to save, 
say with love, u I am glad, for your sake :" while 
the angels of God, with whom " there is joy" for 
"one sinner" saved through the fire of trial, re- 
peat, through the wide extent of heaven, the 
words of Jesus, " I am glad." 

" I am glad, for your sakes, that I was not 
there, to the intent ye may believe." Jesus, in- 
deed, might have been there ; He might imme- 
diately have returned with His disciples to Be- 
thany, surrounded with them the bed of suffer 
ing on which Lazarus lay, and restored him to 
health, by pronouncing over him one word of His 
power. But no ; this was not enough for the 
faith of His disciples. Or again, having gone 
there with them, He might have permitted Laza* 

13* 



150 MEDITATION VI. 

rus to become the prey of death before them; He 
might have allowed them to witness that scene of 
grief, and to bave the sad consolation of accom- 
panying their friend to the grave, from whence 
He was going to recall him. But no : Jesus " was 
glad that He was not there ;" He was glad that 
Fie had spared those whom He loved these hours 
of trial and sorrow, and that He had not brought 
His disciples to the tomb of Lazarus, but to be 
witnesses of the most striking manifestation of His 
power and Godhead; to see Lazarus burst, at His 
command, the bands of the grave, to partake in 
the triumph of their Master, in the joy and conso- 
lation of Mary and Martha ; and, in a word, to 
acquire a stronger faith than they ever had before, 
in Him who had come from the bosom of the 
Father, God manifest in the flesh, whom Ci angels 
worship." 

O happy disciples of so powerful and good a 
Master, — you who have been the objects of so 
much love, so much care, so much tenderness, lift 
up your voice in all ages and in all climes! 
Come and instruct us, stir up our souls, touch our 
hearts, teach us also to love such a Saviour, to 
believe in Him more than we have done hitherto, 
and to live and die in His love ! 

u Nevertheless, let us go unto him," adds 
Jesus. He seems to fear lest, while with a sacred 
joy He comforts His disciples, He should appear 
insensible to the afflictions of the family of Be- 
thany. And as He embraces all His people in 
His loving heart. He urges on the tardy footsteps 



THE FEAR OF DEATH. 161 

of His disciples, too slow for His zeal, saying unto 
them. " Let us go to him." But how ! Lazarus 
is dead ; he has been laid in the sepulchre ; why- 
should Jesus and His disciples go to him ? But 
what does it matter? Is there in heaven or in 
earth, in life or in death, any thing that can 
separate the believer from the love of Christ ? 
Shall the cold stone which covers the tomb of 
Lazarus, and separates him from the world of the 
living, be an obstacle to the burning love of Jesus'? 
No ! " In all these things," saith St. Paul, " we 
are more than conquerors, through Him that 
loved us !" 

Meanwhile, Thomas, one of the disciples, a 
man of a gloomy and melancholy character, and 
of a mind naturally incredulous, is unable to taste 
of the consolation which Jesus offers him. It is 
not without reason that the poet makes-the guar- 
dian angel of this disciple say of him, " His mind 
unfolds thought upon thought, until they expand 
before him, like a shoreless ocean, in which he 
would have been overwhelmed had not the power- 
ful miracles of the Messiah saved him. He has 
ceased to wander amid the labyrinths of thought ; 
he has come to Jesus, And yet," adds the angel, 
"he would still be the object of my lively solici- 
tude, had not God, with a meditative mind, given 
him also an upright and a virtuous heart."* Laz- 
arus (thought he) has gone down to the grave ; 
our Master returns into Judea, where cruel suffer- 
ings, reproach, and death, await Him: after that, 

• Klopst : Messiah : Can. iii 



152 MEDITATION VI. 

what is life to me ? Why should 1 remain on 
this earth ? What would I do without Lazarus ; 
without my Master ? This world would be a 
desert to me, where I should meet with nothing 
but the bitterness of separation and the fatigues 
of warfare. " Let us also go," adds he, turning 
to his fellow-disciples, " and die with him ! ,J 

Strange ! In the first part of this discourse I 
have combated the fear of death, and now, at the 
close of it I am called to combat the disgust of 
life ! So true it is, that the most opposite evils 
meet in that inconsistent creature — man. Alas! 
there is something but t6o natural to man in these 
words — this cry of the soul, wrung from it by des- 
pondency. But it is the expression of a feeling 
which God disapproves of, and against which we 
ought to contend. What ! poor mortal, because 
God hath made thee pass through the furnace of 
affliction, because He hath broken thy rebellious 
will, because He hath presented to thy lips a 
bitter cup, is life at thy disposal ? Thou wilt die ? 
Because some being, too dear to thee, and of 
whom, perhaps, thou hast made an idol, has been 
taken away from thee, life is become a barren 
desert to thee ! thou wilt die ! Because thou 
hast been subjected to afflictions and privations, 
because this hope which from day to day has sup- 
ported thy faith and soothed thy grief, seems to 
have vanished, despondency has filled thy soul ! 
thou wilt die ! Because God appears no longer 
to answer thy prayers and supplications, thou 



DISTASTE FOR LIFE. 153 

ihinkest that thou hast nothing now left thee but 
despair ! thou wilt die ! 

Ah, deceive not yourself! the feeling which in- 
fluences you has nothing in common with that 
holy impatience of St. Paul, to behold, face to face, 
that Saviour for whom he had suffered the loss of 
all things, which he felt when he cried, " I have 
a desire to depart, and be with Christ." No: 
what you feel, amid the evils to which the provi- 
dence of God exposes you, is a guilty rebellion 
against His supreme will. Your murmurs, your 
despondency, proceed from a cowardly unfaithful- 
ness towards Him who has promised that He will 
not suffer you to be tried beyond what you are 
able to bear. If you loved the Lord, if His will 
was dear to you, if your heart submitted to Him 
with adoration and love, no feeling of this nature 
could find place in your breast, for you would 
know by experience that " all things work to- 
gether for good to them that love God." And if 
you love Him not, if your soul has not found in 
Him, as a Saviour, pardon, reconciliation with 
God, and peace, what do you expect in another 
life, whither you wish to go ? What do you ex- 
pect in eternity? Why will you hasten, before 
the time, to the awful scenes of the last day? 
Why do you wish to appear at the bar of the eter- 
nal Judge? Why do you wish to die? Are you 
ready to appear before the holy God? Are you 
prepared to give an awful account of all the ac- 
tions, words, and thoughts of a life defiled by sin? 



154 MEDITATION VI. 

Go to Christ as a Saviour, and live until He calls 
you Himself, to appear before Him as your Judge. 
And even if you have nothing to fear in eter- 
nity, if you know by the testimony of the word of 
God, and by that of the Holy Spirit in your heart, 
that Jesus has saved you, that He died for your 
sins, that His blood has washed away your defile- 
ment, that He has reconciled you to God, why 
would you, by presumptuous wishes, hasten the 
termination of your period of trial? Why would 
you lay aside, before your time, the burden of suf- 
ferings which has been laid upon you? Why 
would you anticipate the will of God? Why 
would you wish to die ? Is there nothing more 
for you to do in this world? Are there about you 
no more poor to relieve, no more miserable to com- 
fort, no more ignorant to instruct? No; do you 
say, my situation is such that I am useful to no 
one. and this afflicts me even more than my own 
sufferings. I can only groan under the weight of 
my sin and my unprofitableness. Ah ! my be- 
loved brother, have you, then, forgotten that you 
are in the school of the Spirit of God, who aims 
at enlarging and purifying the faculties of your 
soul, in order to render it capable, continually more 
capable, of enjoying the delights of infinite love, 
which shall constitute in another world the ele- 
ment of our being? Yes, in edifying those around 
you, by your resignation, your patience in suffer- 
ing, your submission to the will of the kindest of 
fathers, you will enter into the views of God whc 
seeks to accomplish in you that prayer which St 



DISTASTE FOR LIFE. 155 

Paul offered up for his Thessalonian brethren — - 
'- The very God of peace sanctify you wholly ; and 
I pray God your whole spirit and soul and body 
be preserved blameless unto the coming of our 
Lord Jesus Christ. Faithful is He that calleth 
you, who also will do it." (1 Thess. v. 23.) 

That day of Christ, that day appointed by the 
wisdom and love of our God, shall soon come to 
each of us, and then, whatever be our character, 
whatever degree of sanctification and of love we 
have attained, oh ! how shall we be ashamed of 
our lukewarmness, our want of courage in suffer- 
ing and in self-denial, our want of zeal in the ser- 
vice of so good a Master, our want of love for so 
gracious a Saviour. 

O, our God, give us more faith, more confi- 
dence, more love ! Give us grace to employ more 
faithfully these short moments of trial! May out 
souls live to praise Thee ! to ©raise Thee in time ! 
to praise Thee in eternity 



MEDITATION VII. 

THE FOUR DAYS OF TRIAL.— THE FIRST 
CONSOLATIONS. 



John xi. 17—23. 

u Then when Jesus came, He found that he had lain in the grave 
four days already. Now Bethany was nigh unto Jerusalem, about 
fifteen furlongs off: and many of the Jews came to Martha and 
Mary, to comfort them concerning their brother. Then Martha, as 
soon as she heard that Jesus was coming, went and met Him : but 
Mary sat still in the house. Then said Martha unto Jesus, Lord, if 
Thou hadst been here, my brother had not died. But I know, that 
even now, whatsoever Thou wilt ask of God, God will give i: 
Thee. Jesus saith unto her, Thy brother shall rise again." 

In our preceding meditation, we left Jesus on 
His way to Bethany with His disciples, to whom 
He gives serious and salutary instruction in refe- 
rence to what He is going to do. The period of 
trial is about to terminate to Martha and Mary, 
who for a long time have been walking in a dark 
path, amid affliction and grief, looking for consola- 
tion in vain, and unable to comprehend the con- 
duct of their Divine Friend. He comes to them 
at length ; He comes to speak to them of faith, 
of consolation, of eternal life. Thus the Evan- 
gelist brings us back again to the family of Be- 



THE FOUR DAYS OF TRIAL. 157 

thany, and he informs us of what had passed 
there since his Master had received the message 
from the sisters of Lazarus, " Lord, behold, he 
whom Thou lovest is sick." Let us, then, heai 
our historian ; let us follow Jesus to Bethany ; and 
in considering the affliction of the sisters of Laza- 
rus, the consolation which the Jews offer them, 
and the comfort which Jesus gives them, may we 
learn to seek peace and happiness where alone 
they can be found. 

When Jesus arrived, He found that Lazarus 
had already lain four days in the grave. We must 
here suppose that Lazarus died the same day that 
his sisters sent to Jesus : and as Jesus " abode two 
days still" in the Perea, which was a day's jour- 
ney from Bethany, He only arrived the fourth day 
after the death of Lazarus, who, according to the 
usage of the Jews in his time, had been commit- 
ted to the tomb immediately after his death. 

He fell asleep in the faith of his fathers. He 
closed his eyes upon the scenes of this life of sin, 
in the firm expectation of opening them one day 
to behold the glorious scenes of eternity. Like 
Simeon, he could say, in leaving all that was dear 
to him on earth, " Lord, now lettest thou thy ser- 
vant depart in peace' for mine eyes have seen 
Thy salvation." He had entered the haven where 
he had cast the anchor of his hope : but, alas ! his 
sisters whom he loved remain after him, and 
still have to b lfTet the waves and the storm. St. 
John does not say any thing of their conflicts or 
their grief, but our hearts sympathizing with them 

14 



158 MEDITATION VIL 

can tell us what they felt during those four days 
of grief and suffering. Their brother, their friend, 
the companion and support of their earthly exis- 
tence, lias ceased to live. All their affection foi 
hirn has not heen able to snatch him from the cold 
embrace of death. They have received his last 
look, his last farewell, his last sigh. There Re- 
mains to them, of that beloved brother, nothing 
but a remembrance, a regret, his vacant place in 
their dwelling. Already his mortal remains have 
been committed to the grave ; already he has be- 
come the prey of corruption. Oh ! bitter fruits 
of sin, which hath committed such ravages in the 
garden of the Lord ! An immense void is felt in 
the abode of Bethany, and in the heart of the two 
afflicted sisters. The silence of death, interrupted 
only by their sobs, prevails where lately the sweet 
effusions of a pure affection were heard. All is 
changed ; domestic happiness has forsaken them, 
and left them nothing but tears. " A voice said, 
Cry. And he said, What shall . I cry? All flesh 
is as grass, and the goodliness thereof as the flower 
of the field. The grass withereth, the flower 
fadeth ; because the Spirit of the Lord bloweth 
upon it!" 

Brothers and sisters, parents and friends! you 
who have around you those that are dear to you ; 
love them, but beware that you repose not upon 
their frail head your hopes of happiness ! Love 
them for heaven, not for earth! Love them 
for God, not for yourselves! Hear the lesson 
of this disciple of love, who has preserved to us 



THE FOUR DAYS OF TRIAL. 159 

the history upon which we are meditating, and 
who, after many years' experience of life, after 
having grown old in the exercise of that love 
which he recommends to us in every page of his 
writings, inscribes, with a hand enfeebled by years, 
those solemn words, " Little children, keep your- 
selves from idols !" 

Meanwhile, these four long days have passed 
away, and Jesus arrives not at Bethany. Jesus, 
who alone could bring succour to the weeping sis- 
ters j Jesus, whose assistance they had besought ; 
Jesus, who never remained deaf to the complaints 
of any suffering creature : Jesus comes not ! What 
will become of the faith and confidence of the two 
sisters ? What can they expect now ? A single 
word of the Saviour might have put an end to 
their affliction ; they are aware of this ; they know 
His omnipotence. And yet He has given them 
only an obscure answer which they are no longer 
able to comprehend : " This sickness is not unto 
death, but for the glory of God !" And their bro- 
ther has now been four days in the grave, and his 
body has already fallen to corruption. 

O my beloved brethren, you who from a mind 
naturally incredulous, and a heart easily discou- 
raged, feel nothing but distrust, weakness, and 
despondency, in such moments of trial, learn from 
Martha and Mary to know the ways of the Lord, 
which are often obscure. From Abraham, and 
from all the children of God who have obtained 
the crown of victory only after scenes of conflict 
learn " to hope against hope I" Though your 



160 MEDITATION VII. 

heart be destitute of confidence, and your soul like 
a dry and barren wilderness ; though your faith 
be not triumphant, and your hopes be no longer 
able to realize a better country ; though the word 
of God no longer speak to your heart, and prayer 
be no longer a source of living water to you, while 
at the same time you know that there is no other 
remedy for your evils; though all your remaining 
strength be scarcely sufficient to make you to 
feel your corruptions and mourn over them ; yea ; 
though your eye see nothing around you but a 
dark abyss — oh ! tremble not at the sight of that 
abyss j — there, even there, shall there arise in your 
heart a faith which shall not be moved ; there the 
bonds of your communion with God shall become 
so strong that nothing shall be able to break them. 
Jesus is there ; He comes. It is His powerful 
hand that has placed you in that abyss ; and when 
you shall have learned there to renounce all trust 
in yourselves, in your own strength, and in your 
own merits, and to expect all from Him, all from 
His faithfulness, all from His love, that same 
powerful hand will draw you out and place you 
upon the lofty heights of faith, from whence you 
shall praise Him for your sufferings which have 
taught you so many profitable lessons. The sis- 
ters of Lazarus shall learn the language of praise 
and thanksgiving, after they have been taught to 
humble themselves under the hand of the Lord. 

Meanwhile, Martha and Mary, during these 
four days of severe trial, wanted not what the 
world calls consolation. " Now Bethany was 



THE FOUR DAYS OF TRIAL. 161 

nigh unto Jerusalem, about fifteen furlongs off," 
that is, about two miles. M And many of the Jews 
came to Martha and Mary to comfort them con- 
cerning their brother." It was the custom among 
the Jews, as soon as death had brought mourning 
into any family, for the friends of the afflicted par- 
ties to come in great numbers and weep with 
those whom death had just deprived of a relative. 
This, indeed, would have been a beautiful custom 
had it been practised in the spirit of Him who 
"comforts them that mourn;" but, alas! with 
man all things, even mourning and tears, degen- 
erate into lifeless, I had almost said hypocritical 
forms. The Jews, on such occasions, being as- 
sembled at the house of the deceased, instead of 
seeking, in meditation and prayer, that Spirit 
which is called the Comforter, made the air re- 
sound with mournful cries and deafening lamen- 
tations. And if the person whom they mourned 
had been an object of peculiar affection to his 
family, if his death was a painful bereavement to 
them, their lamentations assurnoJ. a character of 
frantic violence. They tore their hair, rent their 
garments, covered themselves with sackcloth and 
ashes, uttering at the same time, piercing cries, 
which were redoubled in proportion as they saw 
the relatives of the dead giving way to their grief. 
In some cases, also, to increase the sadness of 
these gloomy solemnities, women, whose trade it 
was to weep and make lamentations over the 
dead, were paid to offer this strange kind of conso- 
lation to the relatives or connexions of the de 

14* 



162 MEDITATION VU. 

parted t And, moreover, these melancholy cere- 
monies were sometimes accompanied with the 
sound of musical instruments, as we find it des- 
cribed in St. Matthew's Gospel, where he relates the 
restoration of Jairus's daughter to life. " When 
Jesus came into the ruler's house, and saw the 
minstrels and the people making a noise, He said 
unto them, Give place." 

This, indeed, is not the manner in which the 
people of the world, in our day, comfort their af- 
flicted friends. But, alas ! how many " miserable 
comforters" are there to whom the Lord would 
still say, with indignation or compassion, " Give 
place." What do we hear in a house of mourn- 
ing where the Lord is not known and invoked ? 
The friends of the afflicted come to pay what is 
called a visit of condolence. They enter into a 
long detail of the virtues of him who is no more ; 
they repeat to his blinded relatives that he is 
happy, whatever may have been his principles, his 
faith, his hopes ; that he deserved to go to hea- 
ven ; or if it be admitted that he had some failings, 
they trust in a vague idea of the goodness of God, 
behind which His holiness and justice disappear. 
And further, as he brought no stain upon his fami- 
ly, they have reason to be proud of his memory 
In fine, it is added, " We must submit to what we 
cannot alter ; it is the law of nature ; we are all 
mortal ; there is a better world ; a future life." 
Some other common-place remarks of the same 
nature we may perhaps hear, accompanied with 



THE FOUR DAYS OF TRIAL. 163 

a few tears; and such, poor world, are thy com- 
forters and thy consolations ! 

Ah! " give place," a miserable comforters!" or 
if your soul be really touched with my grief, speak 
to me truly of the designs of God, in afflicting 
me ; tell me to humble myself under the hand ol 
Him that smites me, to make me wise unto sal- 
vation ; speak to me of my Saviour ; of Him who 
died to destroy the empire of death and the cause 
of death — sin; speaktome of the sacrifice which 
He offered up to obtain pardon and grace for me ; 
speak to me of the invitations of His love, and o{ 
the new heavens and new earth wherein dwelleth 
righteousness ; speak to me of faith, of hope, and 
of love ; give me one single promise of Him who 
has vanquished death and the grave ; and if I am 
so happy as to be able to apply that promise to 
myself, or to him whose departure I mourn, I 
shall be comforted ; and if I still shed tears over 
his tomb, it shall not be " as those who have no 
hope." But if you cannot speak to me of these 
things, there still remains one powerful means by 
which you can give vent to the compassion with 
which your soul is touched on my behalf; pray for 
your friend ! Ask of God to sanctify to my im- 
mortal soul the trial which He sends me ; ask of 
Him that my head may bow in adoration, and 
that my heart may bend in love, under those strokes 
of His severity which are but the strokes of His 
grace. Ask of God to apply to my heart, by the 
power of His Spirit, the unspeakable consolation 
of His word ; and if you remain thus in silent 



164 MEDITATION VII. 

meditation with me, I shall feel that even your 
silence speaks to my heart and comforts me. 
The Christian alone, whatever be his degree of 
knowledge and of moral culture in other respects, 
finds in his principles and in his feelings this ten- 
der delicacy which reaches the heart, this divine 
art of consoling by a word, a look, even by silence. 
Meanwhile. Jesus approaches Bethany; let us 
follow Him, and see the powerful influence even 
of His presence upon the afflicted sisters. Ci Then 
Martha, as soon as she heard that Jesus was com- 
ing, went and met Him ; but Mary sat still in the 
house.'' Here again we see the two sisters acting 
in conformity with their respective dispositions. 
Both ardently desire the consolations of their 
Heavenly Friend ; but while the active Martha 
yields without delay to the first and lively impulse 
of her heart, and flies to meet Jesus; Mary, 
though feeling even more deeply the need of His 
presence, appears to have been too much oppress- 
ed by the grief of her affectionate soul. She 
seems as if she wished rather to wait till Jesus 
Himself should come, and remove, with His com- 
passionate hand, the burden of grief, the heavy 
cross which weighed down her heart. It requires 
not a very extensive observation of maiiKind to 
discover those shades of feeling and of conduct in 
the religious character, even of those who partake 
of the same faith, the same love, and the same 
hopes. And every particular in these details, so 
true, so minutely characteristic, so evidently given 
by an eye-witness under the guidance of that 



THE FIRST CONSOLATIONS. 165 

Spirit which searches the heart, would furnish, if 
it were necessary, a very powerful proof of the 
truth ol the great historical fact upon which we 
are meditating. 

But while Mary awaits, in the silence of pro- 
found grief, the consolations of ^r Saviour, let us 
follow her sister, who already flies to meet Him, 
as the hart, panting for the water-brook, rushes 
toward the running stream. She is at His feet, 
she prostrates herself before Him who alone can 
pour into the wounds of her heart a healing balm. 
She waited for Him for four days ; but now she 
sees Him ; "Jesus is come!" No sooner have 
these words reached her ears, no sooner is Jesus 
present to her view, than her faith, almost extinct 
before, is rekindled ; a sweet ray of hope pierces 
the gloomy cloud which enveloped her heart. All 
the Jews who had come from Jerusalem to com- 
fort her after their own fashion, are nothing to her 
any longer; she leaves them all, to go and throw 
herself at the feet of Jesus, and there, yielding to 
the first feeling of her heart, which is to lay down 
before the feet of her Heavenly Comforter the 
burden of her affliction, sure that He will sympa- 
thize with her as the best of friends, she exclaims, 
u Lord, if thou hadst been here my brother had 
not died." 

There is doubtless much grief expressed in 
these words ; there is even something of despon- 
dency ; she can look only to the past, to the 
tomb of a beloved brother; she seems to think 
that Jesus has come too late to succour her ; that 



166 MEDITAlION VII. 

now there is nothing left to her but tears. Ye 
there remains in her a remnant of faith, which 
seems to revive, to gather strength, and grow in 
the presence of Jesus. She still believes that, 
had Ele been there, He could have recovered her 
brother, put an e^d to his disease, and with one 
word wrested from death its prey, and from the 
grave its victory. And as the flower, beaten 
down and bruised by the storm, insensibly rises 
under the genial beams of the sun, this germ of 
faith, which remains in the heart of Martha, de- 
velops itself, and grows beneath the compassionate 
and majestic glance of the Saviour. She has 
before her that " High Priest who can be touched 
with a feeling of our infirmities." Her faith 
rises higher every moment, and with every look 
of the Redeemer ; her soul opens again to hope ; 
her heart is no longer shut up by grief; the dark- 
ness of her mind disperses ; her soul, already 
penetrated with an unspeakable consolation, rises 
above the evils which lately overwhelmed her ; 
she feels that Jesus, who has come to her aid, 
will find, in His infinite love and boundless power 
all the blessing which she implores. " But I 
know," says she, with confidence " that even now, 
whatsoever thou wilt ask of God, God will give 
it Thee." 

O, triumph of faith ! O, the happiness of my 
Saviour's presence ! consolation and peace are in- 
deed near unto that afflicted soul which thus opens 
to confidence ! From faith to peace and happi- 
ness there is but one step, or rather, the peace of 



THE FIRST CONSOLATIONS. 167 

God which " passeth all understanding," an J 
which is better than life, is the first and sweetest 
fruit of faith. 

O, disciples of Jesus, you who know that the 
Saviour is always near you, you who have never 
had occasion to exclaim with grief, " Lord, if Thou 
hadst been here," because you know that He is 
always present, always ready to hear you, always 
ready to bless you, why is it that your faith so 
often remains below that of Martha ? Why is it 
that you cannot, like her, throw yourselves with 
confidence upon the power and love of Jesus? 
Why is it that you are so often cast down in your 
trials? Why is it that your soul, overwhelmed 
by your infirmities, languishes in the depths of de- 
spondency and affliction ? Why is it that it can- 
not soar into the regions of faith, hope, peace, and 
joy? Ah! comes it not from this, that you be- 
lieve not, that you have not a simple, childlike 
faith ? Distrust and doubt shut up your heart, 
close your soul against the unspeakable consola- 
tions of your God, and render you deaf to the 
voice of His grace, the voice of His promises, and 
the voice of His love. Instead of abandoning, like 
Martha, your miserable comforters, to go to Jesus, 
whose presence has ever been, and eternally shall 
be, the "fulness of joy," you ask of men consola- 
tions which they cannot give you. Instead of 
drawing refreshment for your soul, which thirsteth 
after peace, from the fountain of living waters, 
you " hew out unto yourselves," in the wilderness, 
w cisterns, broken cisterns," which you well know 



168 MEDITATION VII. 

M hold no water," or else you look only to your- 
selves, to your sufferings, and to your infirmities. 
Instead of taking God at His word, presenting 
His promises to Him as undeniable titles, and tell- 
ing Him, with a full assurance of faith, as Martha 
did to Jesus, " Even now," (yes, even now, when 
all seems lost to me, when all the objects of my 
dearest hopes seem to have disappeared for ever,) 
" even now, I know that whatsoever Thou wilt 
ask of God, God will give it Thee." Instead of 
acting thus, is it not true that you open your Bible 
with distrust, and with a secret repugnance, as if 
it were not the word of God ; as if the invitations 
of that word were not addressed to you, yea, to 
you, who read it with so much indifference ? And 
if, afterwards, you fall down on your knees to pray, 
under a sense of your infirmities, your grief, your 
sins, and defilement, is it not true that you address 
Jesus as if He were no longer " able to save unto 
the uttermost all that come unto God by Him?" 
as if He had not given you " an inheritance incor- 
ruptible, undefiled, and unfading, reserved for you 
in heaven?" as if " His arm were shortened, that 
He could not save," or His love were not great 
enough to do so? O fools! why are we " so slow 
of heart to believe" all that the word of our God 
declares? Do we not know, do we not all know, 
as well as Martha, better than Martha, that what- 
soever our powerful Intercessor shall ask of God, 
God will give it Him ? And can we not answer 
that invitation of His love, u Let him that is athirst 
come ; whosoever will, let him come, and take of 



THE FIRST CONSOLATIONS. 169 

the water of life freely!" O, it is faith that is 
wanting upon earth. " Lord, I believe : help 
Thou mine unbelief !" 

Thus did the presence of Jesus raise up the sis- 
ter of Lazarus out of the depths of grief and de- 
spondency, and restore to her heart faith, confi- 
dence, and peace. Thus Jesus hastens to answer 
tnat faith, and that in such a way as to exercise 
and to increase it at the same time that He at- 
taches to it the most precious promise, exceeding 
all that Martha could expect or hope for ; so true 
is it that " He is able to do for us exceeding abun- 
dantly above all that we can ask or think." Mar- 
tha does not wait for the answer of Jesus. She 
has been deprived of a tenderly beloved brother ; 
her suffering soul seems to demand nothing more 
of the Lord than the strength and submission ne- 
cessary to support so great a trial ; or rather, she 
makes no demand of Him at all ; she casts her- 
self, without reserve or condition, upon His com- 
passion and love : " I know that whatsoever Thou 
askest of God, God will give it Thee." And Je- 
sus promises her a happiness to which she dared 
not to aspire in this world, " Thy brother shall 
rise again!" Ah! it is not, then, by words that 
Jesus comforts the afflicted soul, and that He an- 
swers faith ; no, it is by a promise which should 
make faith rise above all its weakness ; for a pro- 
mise of " Him who cannot lie," is always equiva- 
lent to a gift. " Thy brother shall rise again !'' 
When? how? by whom? are questions which the 
faith of Martha had to answer. And it is thus 

15 



170 MEDITATION VII. 

that Jesus, in answering our faith, finds, as we 
have already remarked, a means to exercise, ele- 
vate, and strengthen it. What are times and sea- 
sons to Jesus? ^ 

Cannot He, at whose voice the dead shall on'? 
day break the bands of the grave, if He see fit 
bring Lazarus out of the tomb, and restore him to 
his sisters? " Thy brother shall rise again !" Let 
this be enough for thy faith ; trust in My power : 
thou shalt no longer weep for being separated 
from one so necessary to thy affection and thy 
happiness. And, indeed, it was not merely for 
the short moment of an earthly existence that 
their souls were united. No ; the bonds which 
unite the friends of Jesus shall not be broken, 
even by death itself That bond is eternal ; that 
bond which had been their consolation, during 
their earthly pilgrimage, shall still powerfully con- 
tribute to their happiness in that heavenly country 
where there is no more death, nor separation, nor 
mourning, nor tears. But yet it is not to that day, 
which shall fill up the measure of the purest feli- 
city of which immortal creatures are capable, that 
Jesus refers, in answer to the faith of Martha. 
We shall soon see Him come forward as the 
Prince of Life, to the tomb of Lazarus, and put 
forth His almighty power, to fulfil more quickly 
the promise which He had just made to Martha. 
And though the faith of the sister of Lazarus does 
not yet rise to the height of that promise, Jesus 
says not to her, as He said on another occasion, 
" According to thy faith be it unto thee !" but He 



THE FIRST CONSOLATIONS. J 71 

^loes for her infinitely " more than she can ask or 
think." 

Oh ! let, then, these promises of the Lord, 
which are all yea and amen in Him, be our eter- 
nal refuge from the shipwreck to which we are 
continually exposed, from the ever-varying winds 
of our unbelief, our weakness, our passions, and 
our corruptions ! His promises, my beloved breth- 
ren, my fellow-voyagers on the stormy sea of our 
terrestrial life, His promises alone will discover to 
our view that Rock of Ages, from whose summit 
we shall be able to contemplate, without fear, the 
billows and the tempest. His promises alone will 
be to us what the star which directs him to the 
port is to the mariner wandering over the surface 
of the deep. His promises alone will bring with- 
in the reach of our observation, "that new earth, 
wherein dwelleth righteousness." Having, then, 
taken in our \ ands and in our hearts, His promi- 
ses, let us go .o Him, and let us present them be- 
fore Him as our only plea ; let us, " in full assur- 
ance of faith," ask of Him light, strength, and life 
for our souls. Then, like the sisters of Lazarus, 
we shall find the sweetest consolation, even at the 
grave of those whom we have most fondly loved 
upon earth. Then these mournful scenes of sepa- 
ration and of grief shall lose their bitterness, and 
disappear, so that we shall be able to discern 
scenes of eternal bliss, which we already possess, 
by a " hope that maketh not ashamed," because it 
is based upon the promise of God. 

Are there among those whom I address on the 



172 MEDITATION VII. 

part of God, any who have suffered in their own 
person, from sickness or pain, or have seen those 
who were dear to them enduring like afflictions? 
let them not hesitate ; let them approach with 
confidence the throne of grace, and say, like the 
sisters of Lazarus, " Lord, he whom Thou lovest 
is sick !" But this is Thy promise ; " Thou woun- 
dest and Thy hands make whole ; Thou killest 
and Thou makest alive !" u I know that what- 
soever Thou wilt ask of God, God will give it 
Thee." Are there among you any who are ex- 
posed to privations, to poverty, to indigence, and 
who have the pain of seeing your children, beings 
whom you love, consumed by want which you are 
unable to satisfy % hasten to bring to Jesus the ti- 
tles to His compassion which He has given you — 
"He who feeds the fowls of the air, and clothes 
the lilies of the field, will He not much more 
clothe you, O ye of little faith ?" " T will never 
leave thee nor forsake thee." And " even now I 
know that whatsoever Thou wilt ask of God, God 
will give it Thee." Is there among those whom 
I address any one whose soul is troubled by a 
sense of sin. or by painful doubts as to his salva- 
tion ? let him hasten to present to the love of a 
redeeming God, his request and his claim, u Thou 
hast borne my sins in Thine own body on the 
tree." " Thou hast come to seek and to save that 
which was lost." I have heard Thy voice : " Come 
unto Me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, 
and I will give you rest." " Him that cometh to 
Me, I will in no wise cast out." ' : Though youi 



THE FIRST CONSOLATIONS. 173 

sins be as scarlet, they shall be as white as snow , 
though they be red like crimson, they shall be as 
wool." " Ho, every one that thirsteth, come ye to 
the waters." " Like as a father pitieth his chil- 
dren, even so the Lord pitieth them that fear 
Him." " When my father and my mother for- 
sake me, the Lord will take me up." " And even 
now I know that whatsoever Thou wilt ask of 
God, God will give it Thee." 

And if we be called to the sweet but difficult 
task of offering consolation to our brethren, let us 
beware of presenting to them the words of man, 
and earthly considerations ; let us approach them 
with a purely christian affection ; let us make 
them feel that we suffer with them, that we share 
their griefs, that we are disposed to listen to their 
complaints, that we understand them ; and when 
a deep and sweet sympathy shall have opened 
their heart to us, oh ! let the word of God be the 
healing balm which we pour into their wounds. 
They will believe and feel that word which so 
powerfully speaks to their hearts, and we shall 
soon see their soul, like that of Martha, coming 
out of the abyss into which it had been plunged, 
and rising triumphantly above doubts, above sin, 
above suffering, and all the miseries of life. And 
we shall see renewed in them the experience of 
the Psalmist, who approaches God with this cry 
of anguish ; " Out of the depths have I cried unto 
Thee, O Lord ;" and terminates it with this song 
of triumph, " Let Israel hope in the Lord : for 
with the Lord there is mercy, and with Him is 

15* 



174 MEDITATION VII. 

plenteous redemption. And He shall redeem 
Israel from all his iniquities." (Ps. cxxx. 1, 7, 8.) 

O happy the man whose hope and consolation 
is in Jesus ! Happy the man, who, in the midst 
of all the miseries with which our life abounds, 
can look by faith to his Saviour, and repeat, with 
full and unreserved confidence, the triumphant 
song of one of God's servants who preceded him 
in his warfare : " The Lord is my light and my 
salvation; whom shall I fear? the Lord is the 
strength of my life, of whom shall I be afraid ? 
Though an host should encamp against me, my 
heart shall not fear ; though war should rise up 
against me, in this will I be confident I" (Ps. 
xxvii. 1, 3.) 

My beloved brethren ! if in the time of trial you 
find in the bottom of your heart neither this faith, 
nor this confidence, nor this peace, remember that 
they are the gift of God. " Ask, and ye shall 
receive ; seek, and ye shall find ; knock, and it 
shall be opened unto you." 



MEDITATION VIII. 



JESUS CHRIST IS THE RESURRECTION AND 
THE LIFE. 



John xi. 24—28. 



'« Martha saith unto Him, I know that he shall rise again in tne res- 
urrection at the last day. Jesus said unto her, lam the resurrec- 
tion and the life : he that believeth in Me, though he were dead, 
yet shall he live : and whosoever liveth and believeth in Me shall 
never die. Believest thou this 1 She saith unto Him, Yea, Lord : 
I believe that Thou art the Christ, the Son of God, which should 
come into the world." 

It is still the touching and instructive conver- 
sation of Jesus and Martha, that is to engage our 
attention. We have seen the faith of this sister 
of Lazarus rise by degrees, until she is able to say, 
with full and unreserved confidence, " I know that 
whatsoever Thou wilt ask of God, God will give 
it Thee." Nevertheless her confidence in the 
goodness and power of Jesus does not, at this 
moment, at least, rise so high as to enable her to 
believe that He can, or that He will, work in her 
favour the most stupendous of miracles, and re- 
store her brother to life. When Jesus addresses 
to Martha this promise, so calculated to inspire 



176 MEDITATION VIII. 

her with the highest expectations, " Thy brother 
shall rise again," we find her answering Him ac- 
cording to an article of faith in the Jewish reli- 
gion, " I know that he shall rise again in the 
resurrection at the last day." So true it is that a 
strong confidence in the goodness of the Saviour, 
and even a strong faith, may leave us below what 
the Saviour is willing to do for us. When Jesus 
spoke to her of the resurrection of her brother, 
Martha thought only of the day, when u the sea 
shall give up the dead that are in it, and death 
and hell shall deliver up the dead which are in 
them I" She believed in the resurrection of the 
last day, before Jesus came to comfort her y but 
how little power has such a faith to raise her soul 
above grief, despondency, and doubt! An ortho- 
dox belief will avail the sou] nothing in the day 
of trial, unless it be endued with a principle of 
vitality by the presence of Jesus, and by His life- 
giving Spirit. Alas ! how many there are who 
can write upon the tomb of one whom they have 
loved, that " He waiteth for the resurrection at 
the last day," who, notwithstanding, ' ; mourn as 
those that have no hope !" 

Jesus Himself, with His love and with His pro- 
mise, must be the life and soul of our religious 
opinions, if we would have them really exert an 
influence upon our heart. Jesus must say to our 
soul, which, alas! is continnally seeking out of 
Him that which is to be found in Him alone, 
u I am the resurrection and the life " Not only 
is it He who at the last day shall with His irresis- 



CHRIST THE RESURRECTION, &C. 177 

tible voice call forth the dead from their graves; 
but He is the Prince of Life ; He possesses life in 
Himself, and He communicates life to whom He 
will. If, then, we have Jesus, we have life ; let 
us not look for it as something future, nor hope to 
obtain it from any other source. He not only 
shows us the way; teaches us the truth ; and pro- 
mises life ; but, He says, " / am the way, the 
truth, and the life." He not only enlightens them 
that are in darkness, but He is the light of the 
world. He not only justifies sinners that come to 
Him, but He is the " Lord our righteousness." 
So that if we be united to Him by faith, the 
blessings of the Gospel are not merely promises 
to us ; we possess them : " I am the resurrection 
and the life : he that believeth in Me, though he 
were dead, yet shall he live : and whosoever 
liveth and believeth in Me shall never die." Let 
us meditate for a moment on these words ; let us 
approach, like Martha, into the presence of Jesus; 
and may He shed abroad in our souls that life 
which is essentially in Him ! 

" I am the resurrection and the life " What a 
declaration! Who could pronounce it? Surely 
not a mere mortal man, one who, so to speak, 
treads continually on the verge of the grave : not 
that miserable worm, whom a few days see come 
into existence and die ; that being who, at his 
birth, carries with him into the world the germ of 
disease, which eventually brings him down into 
the dust ; that being who resembles the perishing 
grass, which in the morning flourishes, and in the 



178 MEDITATION VIII. 

evening is cut down and cast into the oven. No ; 
He who, on the verge of a tomb, proclaims 
Himself the resurrection ; He who, in the abode 
of death, ascribes to Himself the principle of life ; 
He is not merely a mortal man ; He is God ; 
and if it were otherwise, every tomb, every coffin 
would tell Him to His face, that His words were 
nothing but presumption! Yes, when I hear such 
words issue from the mouth of the Son of Mary, 
the Son of the carpenter, I say to myself, either 
He is God, or He is the most presumptuous of 
men, and the most daring of impostors! But far 
be from us this blasphemy ! Let us hear the tes- 
timonies which the Word of Truth bears to Him 
who speaks to the sisters of Lazarus. He it is 
" by whom God made the worlds," who is " the 
brightness of His glory and the express image of 
His person.' 7 He it is that "upholdeth all things 
by the word of His power," to whom the Father 
" Hath given to have life in Himself, even as 
the Father hath life in Himself" He is that 
eternal W®rd, who " was in the beo-inning with 
God, and who was God," by whom all things 
were made, whom " angels worship," " over 
all, God blessed for evermore." Such are, among 
a thousand others, the testimonies of the word of 
that God who cannot lie : such is the truth which 
serves as the basis of the whole edifice of the 
Gospel, — a truth often despised, often misunder- 
stood, often rejected, but which through eighteen 
centuries of impotent contradiction, has come 
down even to us t/iumphant, as it was upon the 



CHKIST THE RESURRECTION, &C. 1 79 

tomb of Lazarus, and constitutes the consolation 
and the joy of all the faithful ; a truth which 
Jesus proposes to Martha as most calculated to 
raise her soul above grief, above death and the 
grave, above all the ravages of sin : i; I am the 
"esurrection and the life." 

Consoling words to him who loves the Lord! 
Words which promise to fallen man the restora- 
tion of his primitive prerogatives ! Words which 
enable him to descry the dawn of a day of hap- 
piness, like that which illumined his state of inno- 
cence before disobedience and sin had brought to 
his ear the fatal word death, and placed before 
his eyes the heart-rending spectacle of all the 
miseries which form its gloomy train ! Ah ! 
phice He, who came to repair the disorder of sin, 
is xh^ resurrection and the life, shall we not find 
in Him all that our soul has need of in its misery? 

Ye^ the 7 ift., the enjoyment of life, the eternal 
continuation c f life. Such is the first, the most 
pressing want of on*- soul, that want which is most 
deeply engraven upon it that want which no crea- 
ture can satisiy. We love every thing that 
breathes life, every thing that produce* it, cverj 
thing that supports it ; we shrink from every thing 
thai; impedes, weakens or destroys it. Hence 
thai sweet emotion which fills our whole being at 
the sight of those first fine days of spring which 
are to mourning nature " the resurrection and tne 
life!" Hence that feeling of me\iiichoiy which 
pervades us when we behold the life of ereation 
languishing at the approach ol a Titer; runce *%t 



180 MEDITATION Vm. 

sweet joy which we experience when we contem 
plate the infant whose every movement breathes 
animation and life ; hence the painful impression 
that is made upon us by the view of decrepit and 
infirm old age, in which the sources of life are ex- 
hausted, and to which there remains but a last 
feeble struggle against the stroke of death. But 
these impressions of pleasure and pain which are 
produced in us by the vicissitudes of life and death 
in the physical world, are feeble in comparison of 
those which we feel when we contemplate the 
immortal soul, to which life and death, far from 
implying the commencement and termination of a 
limited existence, are but the characteristics of a 
state of eternal happiness or of eternal misery. 

Man in his state of innocence enjoyed the ful- 
ness of life. To him life was happiness, because 
it was a sweet communion, a holy intercourse with 
his God. He drew life from the very bosom of 
his Creator ; he inhaled life with the delicious at- 
mosphere of Eden. Love was the element of 
that primitive life ; no other feeling had as yet 
found place in the pure soul of man ; to him to 
love was to live. But, alas ! when I look around 
me and within me ; when I contemplate what is 
now called life, what a difference do I see between 
man's primitive and his present state. What a 
fall: — sin, rebellion, and pollution have broken the 
sweet bond which united the creature to the Cre- 
ator, and have called for the execution of that law 
of eternal justice, " The day thou disobeyest thy 
God thou shalt surely die." And from that time 



CHRIST THE RESURRECTION, &C. 181 

the soul, separated from God, because nothing 
that is defiled can dwell in His presence, has lost 
the happiness of living the life of heaven , from 
that time life has become corrupted and withered 
in its very principle, like a young tree whose root 
has been gnawed by a deadly worm ; from that 
time the sensual and carnal part of man has ac- 
quired the ascendancy over his whole nature ; to 
him to live, is no longer to enjoy the presence of 
God ; to live, in the new sense which is attached 
to that word, is to vegetate for a few days, fulfill- 
ing his own depraved will, and satisfying his own 
desires and passions ; to live, is to drain, even to 
the dregs, the ever bitter cup of his pleasures and 
of his selfishness ; to live is to enjoy for a few mo- 
ments the advantages of his fortune, of his hon- 
ours, of his learning. From that time, according 
to the melancholy but faithful description of St. 
Paul, his understanding has been darkened ; he is 
alienated from the life of God, because of the 
" blindness of his heart j" " he has a name to live, 
but is dead," u dead in trespasses and sins." From 
that time, the poisonous root of sin, which has de- 
filed his soul, has also become a source of pain, 
infirmity, disease, and death to his body. From 
that time, u alas ! every hour opens a grave and 
makes a tear to flow."* From that time, a day 
has not passed that some Martha, some Mary, has 
not gone to weep over the grave of a brother, a 
husband, a father, a friend. " By one man sin 
entered into the world, and death by sin, and so 

• * Chateaubriand. 

16 



182 MEDITATION VIII. 

death passed upon all men, for that all have sin- 
ned." (Rom. v. 12.) 

Oh ! unhappy beings ! who shall deliver us 
from the body of this death? Who shall restore 
to us that life of innocence which of ourselves we 
cannot recover? Who, O my God, shall give 
back to us that life of the soul, that life of Thy 
love ? Hast Thou for ever cast us away from 
Thy presence for our iniquities? Shall we, cap- 
tives in this Babylon of misery, for ever hang our 
silent harps upon the willows by the water side ? 
Shall we never take them down again to sing the 
songs of Zion, to celebrate Thy love, to chaunt 
the anthem of the skies ? 

O my beloved brethren ! my companions in af- 
fliction ! listen ! there is a remedy for your woes ! 
Listen to Jesus speaking from the verge of a tomb, 
" I am the resurrection and the life !" And ima- 
gine not that He would limit the meaning of these 
divine words to this : "I have power, by a single 
word, to give warmth and life to the cold limbs 
of thy brother ; power to call him forth from this 
gloomy abode, and to restore him to thine em- 
brace." Ah ! it is not an existence prolonged for 
a few moments in this world of misery that Jesus 
calls life, No: what He calls by this name is 
real life, the life of the soul, that heavenly life and 
immortality which He has brought to light by the 
Gospel ; the life of a new love to God ; life over 
which death has no dominion ; life which begins 
even here in a soul " born again," and, vanquish- 
ing time and the grave, commences at the foot of 



CHRIST THE RESURRECTION, &C. 183 

Jehovah's throne, the immeasurable periods of 
eternity, the life which St. John calls " eternal 
life," embracing in this word a whole universe of 
happiness, of which a finite and sinful being can 
scarce form the feeblest conception. Such is the 
sense in which Jesus is life to those that love Him. 
He is their life, for he has destroyed the cause of 
death, vanquished a him that had the power of 
death," and " broken down the middle wall of 
partition," which separated us for ever from God. 
He has taken upon Him the sentence of death 
pronounced in Eden and on Sinai ; and having 
nailed to the cross that fatal warrant which would 
have attained every soul of Adam's sinful race, 
He publishes the glad tidings of a free deliver- 
ance ; He proclaims pardon and life ; u he that 
believeth in the Son hath everlasting life ;" " Veri- 
ly, verily, I say unto you, whosoever heareth My 
word, and believeth on Him that sent Me, hath 
everlasting life ; he shall not come into condem- 
nation, but is passed from death unto life." " And 
I give unto them eternal life," saith He, speaking 
of His sheep, u and they shall never perish." " I 
am the way, the truth, and the life." 

But doubtless it will be asked, how shall we be- 
come partakers of this new life ? By what means 
does Jesus communicate to our souls, which, ac- 
cording to His word, are " dead in trespasses and 
sins?" Jesus answers in our text, "He that be- 
lieveth in Me, though he were dead, yet shall he 
live : and whosoever liveth and believeth in Me 
shall never die." Thus He tells us twice ; we 



184 MEDITATION VIII. 

must believe in Him ; believe that He is our Sa- 
viour ; believe with a full assurance of faith, 
founded upon His eternal love and upon the sure 
testimony of His word, that He has purchased life 
for us, that He has paid our ransom, that He has 
saved us, that He will receive us notwithstanding 
all our sins ; believe that He has given us " power 
to become the sons of God," that is, the right to 
be reinstated in the possession of all the privileges 
of which sin hath deprived us, and finally of being 
presented before God His Father with the re- 
deemed of every nation, language, and tribe, whom 
He hath purchased by His blood. 

This faith, — which is the gift of God, which 
Jesus requires of us in every page of His word, 
and which in our text He demands of all those to 
whom He would become the resurrection and the 
life, — far from remaining idle and inoperative in 
the soul in which it dwells, becomes, on the con- 
trary, the powerful and influential principle of a 
new life. It is the sap which carries life into all 
the branches of the renewed tree, and causes it to 
produce, to the joy of its possessor, leaves, and 
blossoms, and fruit. Men of the world, moralists, 
teachers, philosophers, economists, seek if you will 
elsewhere, a principle of moral regeneration for 
nations or individuals. The fruitlessness of your 
efforts will compel you to return to Him who alone 
is the resurrection and the life, and to the means 
which He prescribes — the only effectual means — 
faith ; faith which, by the effectual operation of 
the Spirit, alone can make the soul rise to the life 



CHRIST THE RESURRECTION, &C. 185 

of heaven, disengage it from the shackles of cor- 
ruption, break the chains of its ignominious bon- 
dage, and animate it with the spirit of adoption, 
whereby soaring, like the Apostle, with the glo- 
rious liberty of the children of God, it can joyfully 
repeat, u We have not received the spirit of bon- 
dage again unto fear ; but the spirit of adoption, 
whereby we cry, Abba, Father;" faith, which, 
showing us in the Redeemer a love that is higher- 
than heaven, deeper than hell, breaks the hard- 
ness of our heart, removes its icy coldness, eradi- 
cates its selfishness; faith, which alone renews 
the heart, fills it with a love altogether new, an 
energy and devotedness hitherto unknown, and 
leads the soul to love above all things Him " who 
first loved us ;" faith, which alone produces in an 
immortal soul the germ of a new life that shall 
never perish, but, victorious over time and death, 
shall arrive in all the glory of its strength in the 
element of eternal love, there to develop its 
powers, without limits, in Him in whose presence 
there is " fulness of joy." Such are the means 
which Jesus proposes to us, and by which He 
would become to us " the resurrection and the 
life." 

Having thus the express declaration of Jesus, 
and the experience of His disciples in all ages, 
how is it possible for those who know their own 
hearts, and have found in the Saviour new life for 
their souls, to be arrested for a moment in their 
progress towards the new heavens and the new 
earth wherein dwelleth righteousness, by the mis* 

15* 



186 MEDITATION VIII. 

erable objections which ignorance and self-right- 
eousness advance against this great and only 
means (in the hands of the Spirit) of regeneration, 
holiness, and salvation? The man who feels in 
himself the sacred flame of a devotedness alto- 
gether new, and of a love which he has only 
known since he believed, may indeed be told that 
this doctrine of faith weakens the motives to good 
works; but he will answer, Will you tell me, 
then, that the tree will remain barren, or that it 
will produce nothing but bitter fruit, because it 
has been grafted? That the spring will produce 
foul water, because it has been purified ? The 
word faith signifies confidence, and confidence, 
we know, is the basis of affection and of friend- 
ship. Oh ! which is most worthy of God — to 
serve Him from the affection of a child, who loves 
his father tenderly, or from the mean and selfish 
motive of the mercenary, who looks only to the re- 
ward, or from the servile fear of the slave, who 
has nothing in view but exemption from punish- 
ment? 

Faith, uniting the soul to God, passes over the 
space which separates the finite from the infinite, 
the " things which are only temporal " from those 
" which are eternal." It is " the substance of 
things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen ;" 
it seizes, beforehand, those things which u eye 
hath not seen, nor ear heard, nor the art of man 
conceived ;" it enjoys heaven upon earth ; and 
though still in time, it lives in eternity. Hence 
what need we care for the changes which our mor« 



CHRIST THE RESURRECTION, &C. 187 

tal nature must undergo? Death is our deliver- 
ance, the tomb a passage to eternal life : " Who* 
soever liveth and belie veth in Me shall never 
die." I love to repeat it, that it was at a tomb 
that Jesus pronounced these words ; it was to the 
sister of Lazarus who had lain four days in the 
grave that He gave this consolation. No ; they 
are not dead who are gone before us into a better 
country. No ; they whom you have loved in the 
Lord in this world shall never die. The principle 
of life which iaith implants in their soul is as far 
above all that is mortal as heaven is above earth 
Is it death to lay aside this frail earthly taberna 
cle ; the source of so many pains, so many suffer 
ings, so many sins ? Is it death to be delivered 
from evil, and from all the miseries which are the 
fruits of sin ? No ; that which lives in us by the 
grace of God, through faith, shall never die. 
No ; it is not death, for faith to be changed into 
sight, for hope to be superseded by reality, and 
for love fully to possess and to enjoy its ob- 
ject. It is not death, to see in a copious flood of 
light and truth which in this world we seek amid 
so many errors, and so much ignorance and dark- 
ness. It is not death, to be satisfied with that 
righteousness, that holiness which our soul thirst- 
eth after here below in the midst of corruption. 
It is not death, to be put in possession of that peace 
which we seek here below in the midst of all our 
disappointments, all our sorrows, all our tears. It 
is not death, to see face to face that Divine Re- 
deemer whom here we loved though we saw Him 



188 MEDITATION VIII, 

not, and whom our soul often longed after as 
the bride longs for the presence of him whom her 
soul loveth. No ; it is not death, to possess eter- 
nal life ! " Whosoever liveth and belie veth in 
Me shall never die." 

This faith has produced at all times and in all 
ages the same life and the same hopes. David 
beholds a beloved child seized with a malady 
which threatens to tear him from his affection ; 
he puts on sackcloth and lies upon the earth in 
sign of his deep affliction ; he refuses either to eat 
or to drink. " And it came to pass," the sacred 
historian goes on to tell us, that u on the seventh 
day the child died." The servants of David fear 
to tell him that the child is dead ; for say they, 
4 Behold, while the child was yet alive we spake 
unto him, and he would not hearken unto our 
voice ; how will he then vex himself if we tell him 
that the child is dead?" " But when David saw 
that his servants whispered, David perceived that 
the child was dead. Then David rose from the 
earth, and washed and anointed himself, and 
changed his apparel, and came into the house of 
the Lord and worshipped." His servants, as- 
tonished at his conduct, say unto him, " What, 
then, is this ; thou didst fast and weep for the 
child while it was alive ; but when the child was 
dead, thou didst rise and eat bread? And David 
answered, while the child was yet alive, I fasted 
and wept, for I said, who can tell whether God 
will be gracious unto me, that the child may live ? 
But now that he is dead, wherefore should I fast ? 



CHRIST THE RESURRECTION, &C. 189 

/ shall go to him, but he shall not return to me. 
(2 Sam. xii. 18 — 23.) Touching resignation! 
glorious hope ! sweet fruits of faith ! " Whoso- 
ever liveth and believeth in Me shall never die." 
Ye sisters of Lazarus, of all times and all 
places, who weep for the ravages which death has 
made in your affections, or dread it for yourselves, 
come to the fountain of living waters, come and 
draw from the source of true consolation ; come 
and quench that thirst for immortality, which con- 
sumes you and makes you mourn over the fright- 
ful instability of every thing human and mortal ; 
come to Christ ; come and hear His divine voice ; 
out of His mouth flow consolation, hope, and life. 
What ! saith He unto you as He did unto David, 
to Martha, and to Mary ; what ! thou weepest 
for the death of some dear object of your affec- 
tion ! But cease to call that death which is only 
a birth unto a new life ; cease to mourn for the 
happiness of him who is gone before thee ! " 1 
am the resurrection and the life : he that believeth 
in Me shall never die." " All that are in their 
graves shall hear My voice." Those eyes which 
you once saw closed to the light of heaven, shall 
open again, full of glory, on the day of eternal 
meeting ; those lips upon which you once saw the 
smile of affection playing continually, but which 
you have beheld blanched with the paleness of 
death, shall be reanimated, to commence with 
you, pure from all defilement, the new song of 
eternal deliverance. That hand which, in press- 
ing your hand for the last time, fell cold and life 



190 MEDITATION VIII. 

less, shall be lifted up to the throne of God, with 
your's and with those of all the royal priesthood, 
to adore Him for ever and ever. " They shall not 
return to us, hut we shall go to them." " Jesus is 
the resurrection and the life !" " O death, where 
is thy sting ? O grave, where is thy victory ? 
Thanks be to God, which giveth us the victory, 
through Jesus Christ our Lord !" 

"Believest thou this?" saith Jesus to the sister 
of Lazarus, with an accent of the tenderest love 
and desiring to draw forth from her a confession 
which would evince that she had in her heart this 
principle of eternal life. If thou believest this, 
He seems to say, thou shalt soon find in that faith 
a healing balm for thy deep affliction ; thy tears 
shall be changed into thanksgivings ; the darkness 
which envelops thy soul shall be dissipated by 
that bright light ; the pain of separation, so ago- 
nizing to the unbeliever, to him who has not a 
living faith, shall be alleviated by the assured 
hope of an eternal reunion. 

[ also, on the part of God, ask you, O immor- 
tal beings who hear me! believe ye this? Is 
Jesus to you the resurrection and the life ? Can 
you joyfully apply to yourselves these words of 
eternal truth, " Whosoever liveth and believe th 
in Me shall never die ?" When you contemplate 
as at hand, the grave which shall soon open to 
receive you, and into which all that is mortal in 
you shall soon descend, can you with confidence 
look beyond it, to that eternity which is the 



CHRIST THE RESURRECTION, &C. 19 

object of the wishes and hopes of the redeemed 
of Jesus? 

Oh! may you. may we all be enabled to 
answer with the confidence of Martha, " Yea, 
Lord, I believe that Thou art the Christ, the Son 
of the living God, which should come into the 
world,' ; — come from heaven to bring down the 
truth and life to earth. Error proceeds from 
earth ; falsehood comes from hell ; but Thou, 
Lord, art come from the bosom of the Father, to 
reveal Him to us ; Thy word is truth. I have 
not seen God ; I have not, like Martha, seen 
Jesus. I see man die and descend into the grave ; 
none of the blessed, none of the reprobate have 
ever come to me, to bear witness to the truth of 
the word of my Saviour ; and nevertheless I be- 
lieve ; " I believe that Thou art the Christ, the 
Son of God, that should come into the world." 
I see an unbelieving world counting my faith 
folly, and my hope a mere delusion, which they 
ridicule ; and yet, O my Saviour, " I believe that 
Thou art the Christ, the Son of God, that should 
come into the world." I see a world that lieth in 
wickedness delivering themselves up to sin and 
corruption, as if Thou hadst not died for sin, as if 
there were neither death, nor judgment, nor 
resurrection, nor life ; but though the whole world 
were to rise up against the word of truth, and 
against the holiness of Thy law, and though they 
were to "kill thy prophets, and throw down Thine 
altars," yet, O my Saviour, would I believe that 
* Thou art the Christ, the Son of God, that should 



192 MEDITATION VIH. 

come into the world," I would believe that Thou 
art to my soul, " the resurrection and the Hfe !" 

O Redeemer, since this faith in Thy salvation 
is a free gift of Thy grace, condescend to grant it 
to us all, while there is yet time ! Make all 
these immortal beings feel the folly of seeking 
happiness in that which must become the prey of 
death, instead of going to Thee, who art the re- 
surrection and the life ! Above all, Lord, when 
Thou smite st them with the rod of affliction, 
when some painful event, some unexpected death, 
some heart-rending separation takes place, and 
brings trouble into their hearts, oh ! then, let 
them hear Thy voice of love issuing from beneath 
the ruins of that superstructure of false happi- 
ness which they had erected far from Thee, and 
crying unto them with power, " believest thou 
this 2" Believest thou that I alone am the resur- 
rection and the life ; believest thou that without 
Me there is nothing but grief, doubt, vexation of 
spirit, and eternal death % O, Jesus, may every 
thing in this life fade away and disappear before 
the happiness of loving Thee ! To Thee this 
heart belongs ; may it beat for Thee alone ! and 
when it has but one last breath to breathe into 
Thy bosom, may that breath bear to the foot of 
Thine eternal throne this cry of hope, " Christ, 
Christ is my life ; death is gain to me ! Amen, 
Lord Jesus, Amen." 






MEDITATION IX. 

JESUS WEPT. 
John xi. 28—36. 

* And when she had so said, she went her way, and called Mary hei 
sister secretly, saying, the Master is come, and calleth for thee. 
As soon as she heard that, she arose quickly, and came unto Him. 
Now Jesus was not yet come into the town, but was in that place 
where Martha met Him. The Jews then which were with her in 
the house, and comforted her, when they saw Mary, that she rose 
up hastily and went out, followed her, saying, She goeth unto the 
grave to weep there. Then when Mary was come where Jesus 
was, and saw Him, she fell down at His feet, saying unto Him, 
Lord, if Thou hadst been here, my brother had not died. When 
Jesus therefore saw her weeping, and the Jews also weeping 
which came with her, He groaned in the spirit, and was troubled, 
and said, where have ye laid him? They said unto Him, Lord, 
come and see. Jesus wept. Then said the Jews, Behold how He 
loved him !" 

The nearer the history which we are consider- 
ing approaches to its conclusion, the more lively 
and touching is the interest which it excites. Eve- 
ry step in this great transaction is so sublime, sc 
beautiful, so much above the ordinary course of 
human affairs, that we cannot but anticipate a 
conclusion in unison with so much grandeur. 
And what may we not expect from an action of 
which Jesus is the soul and the author. He is 

17 



194 MEDITATION IX. 

represented to us with a majesty altogether divine 
in the foreground of that historical picture which 
is exhibited to our view. He appears in the midst 
of the surrounding company like a sun communi- 
cating to the worlds around it that lustre with 
which they shine to our eyes. Lazarus, Martha, 
Mary, Thomas, and the other disciples, all look 
upon Jesus, all direct to Jesus their thoughts, their 
affections, their prayers, their tears ; all partake 
of His light, His grace, His consolations. And if 
some of His expressions, if some of His actions 
have hitherto appeared to us obscure or mysteri- 
ous, we cannot doubt but that a word of His power, 
and of His love, will soon dissipate all those clouds, 
throw torrents of light upon these obscure points 
of His conduct, and command our adoration and 
surprise. 

But before our historian proceeds to this part 
of his narrative, he calls us once more to meditate 
upon the tomb of Lazarus. Before he shows us 
his Master displaying the power of God the Crea- 
tor, by whom all things were made, he wishes us 
once more to trace the emotions of His generous 
and compassionate heart, until he comes to that 
part of the conduct of Jesus which speaks more 
than volumes, and which ought to draw from us 
tears of tenderness and of gratitude . " Jems wept. 1 ' 

Martha, Mary, and Jesus are now going suc- 
cessively to draw our attention. Martha had felt 
her faith and her hopes revive in the presence of 
Him who is called the " Resurrection and the 
Life." " Yea, Lord," she had said, « I believe 



JESUS WEPT. 195 

that Thou art the Christ, the Son of God, that 
should come into the world." I see in Thee the 
Messiah promised to Israel, the Deliverer, the 
Expectation of ages, the Desire of all nations ; 
Him, whom all those who, like Simeon and Anna, 
waited for the consolation and deliverance of Is- 
rael, have longed after with the most ardent desire. 
And as soon as Martha recognizes in Jesus her 
Saviour, she also sees in Him her Almighty Com- 
forter. Her tears cease to flow ; with faith come 
back confidence and peace, and she experiences 
the truth of that promise of Jesus which He has 
connected with a gracious invitation, " Come unto 
Me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and 
I will give you rest : and ye shall find rest unto 
your souls." 

But Martha cannot enjoy these sweet and pre- 
cious consolations alone. She has not forgotten 
that her sister who " sat still in the house" is 
plunged in the deepest distress ; she leaves Jesus 
for a moment and flies to Mary to acquaint her 
with the good news — the arrival of their celestial 
Friend. " She went her way, and called Mary 
her sister secretly, saying, The Master is come, 
and calleth for thee." Mary had shared in her 
sister's grief; Martha now wishes to make her a 
sharer in her joy ; the two sisters had wept togeth- 
er, it is but natural that their affectionate hearts 
should now rejoice together ; they had drunk to- 
gether the cup of grief, it is right that they should 
now taste together the sweets of divine consolation. 
How beautiful, how noble, and delightful is that 



196 MEDITATION IX. 

union of christian hearts, in which all is in com- 
mon — joy and grief, pleasure and pain, hopes and 
fears. How much superior to all the relations 
of the world is that association of two beings who 
would feel a delicate scruple to enjoy any pleasures 
without one another, and each of whom would 
be nobly jealous of seeing the other suffer without 
taking a part in his sufferings. It is only in the 
love of God and in communion with Jesus, that 
these relations, as holy as they are sweet, can sub- 
sist ; these relations which are the only ones that 
deserve the name of friendship. If these con- 
nexions be unreservedly placed under the influence 
of the Spirit of God, (for without that all is vanity, 
idolatry, snare, and sin,) what blessings must they 
not be the source of! Strangers and pilgrims 
upon earth, what encouragement must it afford 
us to have faithful fellow-travellers ! Combating 
in an arena where we are called every day to con- 
tend against sin, the world, and our own hearts, 
what a source of happiness must it be to have 
brethren in arms, who share our dangers, and who 
by their words and by their example encourage 
us to press on to victory ! Weak and sinful as we 
are, what a privilege is it to have near us a frater- 
nal hand which is ever stretched forth to point 
out to us our dangers, to support and assist us ! 

Martha returns to the house ; she sees her be- 
loved sister still a prey to the deepest grief; she 
calls her, takes her apart secretly, as our text tells 
us, to announce to her the happy tidings of the 
arrival of Jesus. We ought indeed to be ready 



JESUS WEPT. 197 

at all times " to give a reason of the hope that is 
in us with meekness," yet there are many experi- 
ences incident to the christian life which the dis- 
ciple of Jesus alone can comprehend. Martha 
knew this, and notwithstanding the ordinary quick- 
ness of her impressions, she felt that there was no 
other heart but that of Mary to which she could 
open her's, or which was capable of entering into 
her hopes and joys. The Jews with whom the 
house was crowded would perhaps have seen, in 
her love for Jesus, nothing but exaggeration, in 
her faith nothing but enthusiasm, in her hopes 
nothing but delusion. Perhaps, also, the solemn 
declaration of Jesus, " I am the resurrection and 
the life ; he that believeth in Me, though he were 
dead, yet shall he live," and that significant ques- 
tion by which it was followed, " Believest thou 
this?" had awakened in the mind of Martha some 
secret hope of seeing again upon this earth a 
brother who had been so dear to her. And to 
whom but to Mary could she open her mind on 
such a subject without being accused of fanati- 
cism and folly? There may exist in the heart of 
the child of God a hope so aspiring, a feeling so 
deep, that he would think it a profanation to ex- 
pose it to the ridicule or sarcasm of the unbe- 
liever. I 

u The Master is come," saith Martha, with the 
lively feeling of happiness which one experiences 
who announces to the afflicted soul the most 
cheering intelligence. " The Master is come ! ' 
This word alone, in Martha's estimation, should 

17* 



198 MEDITATION IX. 

be sufficient to draw Mary out of the depth of her 
affliction. It is as if she had said, " True, we have 
suffered long: we have seen the sweet ties of do- 
mestic affection snapped asunder ; w** have seen 
Lazarus, whom we so much loved, die and go 
down to the grave ; we have long waited in vain 
for Jesus our great Comforter ; we have long shed 
tears of affliction far from Him ; but ' the Master 
is come ;' already I have experienced in His pre- 
sence unspeakable consolation ; I have felt His 
peace, which is better than life, return to my 
heart. Nothing is impossible with Him ; He has 
declared to me that He is ' the resurrection and 
the life,' that ' whosoever belie veth in Him, though 
he were dead, yet shall he live 1 He comes to 
comfort us, our sorrow shall be changed into joy, 
our grief into lively gratitude, c The Master is 
come, and calleth for thee.' " 

" He calleth for thee !" What love is this of 
Jesus ; what consolation for Mary in her grief! 
Ah ! He whom she waited for so long, and with 
such an ardent desire, has not forgotten her. Like 
the Psalmist, she might have exclaimed, in her 
anguish, " My soul waiteth for the Lord more 
than they that watch for the morning." And 
now the hour of deliverance is arrived ; Jesus 
comes Himself to comfort her ; He comes to re- 
move from her soul the burden which oppresses 
it, the cross which He had laid upon her for * 
time ; He comes to pour into the bleeding wounds 
of her heart the balm of consolation. 

O my beloved brethren, acknowledge, adore the 



JESUS WEPT. 199 

iove and the faithfulness of the Saviour. He is 
always the same. When you are called to the 
sweet task of bringing consolation to some suffer- 
ing soul, some soul weeping over the tomb of a 
beloved object; some soul groaning under a sense 
of its corruption, its sins, its unworthiness before 
God ; some soul plunged in the depths of doubt 
and of distrust: oh! then, do as Martha did to 
Mary ; comfort that soul with these words : " The 
Master is come, and calleth for thee." He is 
come, suffering soul, afflicted soul, sinful soul ; that 
good Master, that loving Saviour, that divine 
Friend whom thou thinkest to be far from thee is 
at hand ; He is come ; He has not forsaken thee ; 
He watcheth over thee; He is come, ready to 
receive thy first sigh of repentance, thy first cry 
of distress ; He is come, ready to pardon, to bless 
thee; u He is come, and calleth thee 1" He call- 
eth thee, by this very affliction, this very sickness, 
as well as in every page of His word ; He calleth 
thee, to make thee fully enjoy the consolations of 
His grace ; He calleth thee, to speak to thy soul 
of pardon, reconciliation, peace, and love ; He 
calleth thee, to gather thee into His sheepfold ; 
He calleth thee, that coming out of this affliction, 
this despondency, these doubts, this unbelief, thou 
may est be enabled to range thyself among the 
number of the redeemed — His beloved children. 

" He calleth thee!" Take heed that thou be 
not deaf nor insensible to this call. Beware of an 
offensive distrust, an injurious doubting ; beware 
of imitating those infatuated persons who were 



200 MEDITATION IX. 

invited to the marriage supper, and who all begar 
with one consent to make excuse ; beware of say 
ing that thou art unworthy of Him, that thou art 
too miserable, too sinful. Ah ! it is just because 
thou art a sinner that it behoved Him to become 
a Saviour ; it is because thou art poor, blind, na- 
ked and miserable, that thou must come to Him, 
" who though He was rich, for our sakes became 
poor, that we through His poverty might be rich." 
u He calls not the righteous, but sinners to repen- 
tance." His invitations are free ; He does not 
sell His favours, He gives them. And canst thou 
suppose that He calls thee, intending to reject 
thee ; canst thou suppose that He thus trifles with 
thy misery and thine affliction ? Far be from us 
this blasphemy of unbelief. O Jesus, my Saviour! 
I hear Thy call ; I will go ; I will hasten like 
Mary ; I will go to Thee that I may have life. 
Ah ! to whom else shall I go ? Thou hast the 
words of eternal life ! 

Mary hath not yet attained to the faith and 
lively hopes of Martha ; grief is too deep in her 
feeling heart. Meanwhile she hastens to obey 
the call of Jesus. Even the soul which is encom- 
passed with afflictions and harassed with doubts, 
when it is acquainted with the Saviour's faithful- 
ness and love, makes efforts to rise up to Him, 
and, as it were, " feels after God." But who can 
restrain one who has clearly heard the call of 
Jesus? one 'to whom it has been said, " The Mas- 
ter calleth thee?" Ah! such a one feels the ap- 
proach of deliverance, and as the flower turns its 



JESUS WEPT. 201 

head towards the sun, and opens to receive its en 
lightening beams ; as the stag, panting from the 
heat of the desert, plunges into the running stream; 
as the child runs with tears into the embrace of 
its mother, whom it had lost, thus the soul, thirst- 
ing for consolation, peace, and rest, opens to the 
sweet influence of the presence of its redeeming 
God, quenches its thirst at that well of living 
water which springe th up unto everlasting life, 
and flies with confidence into the arms of that 
Heavenly Father who has a remedy for all its evils, 
and in whom " there is plenteous redemption." 
" As soon as she heard that, she arose quickly, 
and came unto Him." 

But we have already said, according to the 
declaration of St. Paul, that " the natural man re- 
ceiveth not the things of the Spirit of God;" and 
the Jews who were with Mary on this occasion 
afford a confirmation of this sad truth. St. John, 
before he shows us Mary at the feet of Jesus, 
speaks of these Jews, and tells us what they 
thought, and what they said, as if to give a shad- 
ing to the picture. " The Jews, then, which were 
with her in the house, and comforted her, when 
»hey saw Mary, that she rose up hastily, and went 
out, followed her, saying, She goeth unto the grave, 
to weep there." It was a custom in the East, 
which continues to the present time, to go frequently, 
during the first days of mourning, to the tomb of 
the departed, and " weep there." He who has 
not yet heard the call of Jesus, or has shut his 
heart against it ; he who is ignorant cf the irresis 



202 MEDITATION IX. 

tible attraction which leads the afflicted soul to 
throw itself at the feet of the Saviour ; he who 
has never drawn supplies from the source of true 
consolation, by private prayer in the closet. — such 
a one cannot comprehend the conduct and the 
joys of the child of God. He cannot conceive 
that a soul in deep affliction can have any other 
remedy for its grief, than the melancholy privilege 
of going and weeping over the tomb, which has 
just swallowed up the object of itstenderest affec- 
tions and of its dearest hopes. He follows, with 
an inconsolable regret, these poor mortal remains. 
The Jews wept and lamented over the graves of 
their friends for seven days consecutively. We 
in our days erect a monument to perpetuate our 
sorrow, to hide, if possible, the vanity of every 
thing human, and banish from our minds the 
humbling truth that K all flesh is as grass, and 
all the glory of man as the flower of the field.'* 
We attach ourselves also with a grief that knows 
no remedy, and with wounded affections, to that 
which is already reduced to dust. " We weep as 
those that have no hope." To give a colour to 
this sadly idolatrous worship, we call it " the re- 
ligion of the tomb." Alas ! we might with more 
propriety designate it the religion of despair, or, to 
use a milder expression, the poetry of grief . 

No, Mary is not gone to the grave ; she knows 
that Jesus is come ; she goes to lay at His feet 
the burden of her grief, to open her heart to Him, 
as Martha had done. She throws herself at His 
feet, weeping abundantly ; " Lord," says she, * il 



JESUS WEPT. 203 

Thou hadst been here, my brother had not died !" 
This is all that her grief and her sobs allow her to 
utter. She has sufficient faith, sufficient confi- 
dence, to throw herself at the feet of Jesus, forget- 
ting, in His presence, the crowd that surrounds 
her — forgetting the whole universe besides. But 
this is the utmost that her deep affliction permits 
her to do. She had not sufficient strength, and 
perhaps not sufficient faith, to add to her com- 
plaint like Martha, " But even now I know that 
whatsoever Thou wilt ask of God, God will give 
it Thee." Her silent grief does not let us see 
what passes in her afflicted heart. Has a dark 
veil of sadness enveloped her, and hid from her 
view the objects of her faith and hope ? Do her 
words mean, that since u her brother is dead," 
every thing has become indifferent to her? Does 
she see no remedy for her afflictions? Does she 
think that Jesus is come too late to repair her 
loss? " If Thou hadst been here?" Does she 
imagine that the grave can put bounds to the 
power of her Divine Friend ? Is it despondency 
and distrust that extort from her these expressions 
of so deep a melancholy, " My brother would not 
have died?" Or is it that, full of confidence, she 
deems it enough to show to her Saviour, in a sin- 
gle sentence, her whole grief, to open to Him her 
heart, to prostrate herself at His feet, to feel her- 
self near Him in her affliction, as she was for- 
merly, when she sat at His feet and heard His 
word ? Does she in her trial feel the reality of 
His promises and of His word, which she had so 



204 MEDITAT30N DC. 

often heard ? Is her faith a light shining in dark- 
ness ? Are her hopes a healing balm to the 
wound of her heart ? We love to think so ; we 
love to see in her silence the confidence and peace 
of her soul, expecting every thing from Jesus, and 
throwing itself upon His tender compassion. We 
love to see in it that patient waiting which has 
never been disappointed, since Mary experienced 
the faithfulness and love of the Saviour far beyond 
what she could have expected. 

O, my beloved brethren ! disciples of Jesus ! 
how sweet is it for us to know that in all our trials 
even should we, in the despondency of our souls, 
have only strength enough, like Mary, to cast our- 
selves at the feet of that great High Priest, who 
can be u touched with a feeling of our infirmities,*' 
yet this will be sufficient to move His generous 
heart in our favour, sufficient to attract towards us 
a look of His tender compassion and infinite good- 
ness. Never has the cry of an afflicted soul found 
the heart of Jesus insensible ; never has a single 
sigh of a broken and contrite heart ascended in 
vain to the throne of grace. " This poor man 
cried, and the Lord heard him, and delivered him 
out of all his troubles. O taste and see that the 
Lord is good : blessed is the man that trusteth in 
Him. ' (Ps. xxxiv. 6, 8.) 

This silence of Mary, at tne feet of Jesus, is in 
perfect harmony with her whole character. More 
feeling than Martha, her grief is also more pro- 
found. All her lively and deep impressions are 
concentrated to one point in her soul. She is not 



JESUS WEPT. 205 

able to express herself in words, to address a 
prayer to her Saviour, or to declare her confidence 
in Him. She lies in silent prostration at His feet. 
She cannot join in that song of triumph, with one 
who was animated by an all powerful faith, 
u We glory in tribulation also, knowing that tribu- 
lation worketh patience, and patience experience, 
and experience hope, and hope maketh not 
ashamed, because the love of God is shed abroad 
in our hearts by the Holy Spirit which is given 
unto us." The experience of every day evinces 
that persons of a deeply susceptible nature — those 
who, like Mary, make all their theology, all their 
religion, consist in feeling, as a counterpoise to the 
lively enjoyments which they derive from the sub- 
lime truths of the Gospel — are called to endure 
far more painful conflicts than those who live a 
life of simple faith. The path which they pursue 
is more difficult and dangerous, because every ob- 
ject makes a deeper impression upon them, every 
untoward event which they meet in life shakes to 
its foundation this power of feeling, and lays siege 
to their faith, their religion, the very life of their 
soul. Oh ! how necessary, then, was it that the 
word of God should erect the structure of our eter- 
nal salvation upon the immoveable rock of God's 
faithfulness, against which the waves and the 
storms may exercise their fury, but they are broken 
and expire at its base. 

If by faith we be established upon the Rock of 
Ages, sombre clouds may gather around us, dark- 
ness may become more dense, it may spread over 

18 



206 MEDITATION IX. 

the heavens a gloomy veil, and shut out from us 
every ray of celestial light, yet shall we wait upon 
the Lord ; and our expectation shall not he disap- 
pointed. Let not then the continual variations of 
religious feeling which we may experience, be 
ever the measure of our assurance of salvation j 
otherwise we shall continually see our peace, our 
hopes, our eternity, exposed to the mercy of all 
those infirmities which in this life may take away 
from us the sensible enjoyment of God's presence, 
of His pardon, of His grace, and of His adoption. 
It is not written u the just shall live by feeling," 
but " the just shall live by faith." God forbid that 
we should be understood to mean by this faith a 
mere barren adherence to the truths of the Gospel 
producing no influence upon the heart, or a pre- 
sumptuous assurance founded upon mere notions 
of the mind. The faith which does not " work by 
love" is not a true faith, and " he that loveth not 
hath not known God, for God is love." Such are 
the two rocks between which we have to steer, 
and upon which many souls have made shipwreck. 
Happy that soul who, to avoid the one and the 
other, sits like Mary at the feet of Jesus, to hear 
Him in the time of prosperity, and whom the day 
of trial still finds, like her, at the feet of Jesus 
waiting for assistance from Him. 

But let us hasten to turn our eyes towards Je- 
sus. We love to contemplate Him in the midst 
of this scene of grief. Ah ! He does not remain 
insensible to it. He beholds Mary at His feet, 
overwhelmed with her affliction, and unable to 



JESUS WEPT. 207 

do any thing but weep. He sees the Jews, some 
of whom, we hope, really sympathize with her ; 
while the greater part but imitate her grief, and 
make lamentation according to the usage of their 
country on such occasions. At this sight Jesus, 
who was no stranger to any of those emotions 
which thrill through the depths of the human 
heart, " groaned in spirit and was troubled " 
What was it that passed in His great soul'? What 
mortal can fathom His emotions, His trouble of 
mind, and tell us what he felt ? If we take the 
original word in its literal signification, we shall 
see in Jesus, besides the feeling of tender sympa- 
thy which the scene before Him excited in His 
breast, a feeling of that holy impatience which 
He frequently experienced at the view of the 
weakness, corruption, and unbelief of those from 
whom he had a right to expect the greatest con- 
fidence. " C unbelieving generation ! how long 
shall I be wi ii you ? how long shall I suffer you ? 
What ! are those Jews to whom I have exhibited 
my works, who have heard my instructions since 
the commencement of my ministry, still unable to 
offer to the afflicted any thing but worthless con- 
solations? What! is Mary herself, who has been 
so highly favored, able only to utter words of de- 
spondency, I had almost said, of reproach? * If 
thou hadst been here, my brother had not died ! 
c O ye of little faith, how great is your weakness ! 
how easily does distrust insinuate itself into your 
hearts ! A few days of trial, a few days of waiting, 
and you have no more faith ! How ignorant are 



208 MEDITATION DC. 

the most enlightened ! how weak the strongest! 
how ungrateful the most affectionate !' w 

Or are we to regard the trouble and emotion 
of Jesus as expressive of a feeling of grief at the 
sight of human misery, of which He had before 
His eyes so melancholy a picture ? Is He moved 
with indignation 5 has He put on " vengeance as 
a cloak," against him " who hath the power of 
death," against him by whom u sin entered into 
the world, and death by sin," and with whom He 
is going to engage in a contest, which shall show 
to all future generations, that the powers of hell 
are in subjection to the eternal Son of God, and 
that Satan shall shortly be bruised under the feet 
of God's children? or was it only a deep compas- 
sion for the afflicted sisters that Jesus felt? This 
the expressions in the original scarcely allow us 
to believe. But whatever it was, we shall see 
Jesus moved even to tears by this tender compas- 
sion. And whatever was at first the real cause 
of His trouble, He turns from the scene which 
He has before His eyes ; He hastens to go for- 
ward to the accomplishment of His work ; He 
demands where the mortal remains of Lazarus 
are laid; He turns toward the sepulchre, where 
He is going to show unto the world, that to Him 
nothing is impossible. 

" And He said, Where have ye laid him? 
They say unto Him, Lord, come and see." Jesus 
had stopped to suggest consolation to Martha, to 
give her encouraging promises, to reason with 
her. But He who searcheth the heart, He who 






JESUS WEPT. 209 

well knows what kind of consolation is suited tc 
each of His people, touched with compassion for 
this deep affliction of Mary, mourns with her, 
weeps with her, and asks for the tomb of her bro- 
ther, in order to show her, by His power, His love 
and faithfulness. He alone is really capable of 
comforting the afflicted, who loves them, suffers 
with them, and shares their grief. Even the 
people of the world feel to a certain degree what 
a real comforter ought to be. They say, u We 
condole with one for whom we care but little ; we 
weep with a friend." Oh ! let us endeavour to 
feel, that the more we are animated by that true 
charity, that ardent love which glowed in the 
heart of Jesus, the more we shall be capable of 
comforting our afflicted brethren in their trials ; 
and the more we shall be disposed to comfort 
them by actions, by devotedness, and if it be ne- 
cessary, by sacrifices. " Where have ye laid 
him?" asks Jesus. And while they conduct Him 
to that abode of death, His thoughts rest upon 
Lazarus, the object of so much affection, but at 
the same time of so much grief and of so many 
tears. His heart, moved, by what He sees 
around Him, cannot contain all the feelings 
which crowd upon it, and He who was God, and 
who yet has been called with truth the most 
humane of mankind, restrains not His tears : 
" Jesus wept." 

u Jesus wept !" divine words ! words which 
penetrate into the depths of the most unfeeling 
heart, to search if there be a last chord which 

18* 



210 MEDITATION IX. 

they can make vibrate there ! words upon which 
we may meditate but not discourse, because in 
hearing them a multitude of thoughts and feel- 
ings press forward, and fill our whole soul. The 
pen even of St. John declined to make a single 
reflection upon them. These words escaped, as 
it were, from His affectionate heart, and he 
thought, doubtless, " Here is a subject of medita- 
tion for ages." Some of the Jews who were pre- 
sent exclaimed, "Behold, how He loved him!" 
But how far were they, as we ourselves are, from 
comprehending the tears of Jesus. 

Doubtless we can say with them, " Behold, 
how He loved him!" for already St. John hath 
told us, "Jesus loved Martha, and Mary, and 
Lazarus ;" and He who was never found insensible 
to any of our miseries ; He who was touched with 
compassion for the multitude which pressed around 
Him, " because they were as sheep having no 
shepherd ;" He who shed tears of pity over the 
guilty and hardened inhabitants of Jerusalem, who 
were going to put Him to death ; He who with 
His dying voice prayed with the tenderest charity 
for His murderers, He doubtless must have been 
deeply affected by the afflictions of those for whom 
He cherished a particular affection. It is then per- 
mitted to us also to weep on account of our own 
trials and those of our friends. If but the dispen- 
sations of our God find our heart, and our will, 
submissive to His absolute sovereignty over us, 
this expression of our grief has nothing inconsis- 
tent with the christian character. The Gospel 



JESUS WEPT. 211 

has nothing in common with stoicism. Abraham 
wept over the tomb of Sarah ; Jacob over the 
tomb of Rachel'; David over that of Absalom; 
Jesus over that of Lazarus. So long as our trials 
have not the effect of weakening our faith, render- 
ing our submission less sincere, our hopes less lively, 
our love less real, we may allow our hearts to 
grieve, our tears to flow. The worldly man may 
accuse us of weakness ; some Christians even may 
suspect the reality of our faith, and the sincerity 
of our submission, but Jesus, who searcheth the 
heart, will not condemn us ; He will remember 
His own tears ; He will have pity upon ours. 
"Jesus wept !" 

Jesus has before Him a striking example of the 
instability of all human joys. A short time ago 
the abode of Bethany, now a house of mourning, 
was the dwelling of peace and happiness. Laza- 
rus was the joy and hope of his two sisters ; Mary, 
sitting at the feet of Jesus, heard with delight the 
words of eternal life which flowed from His lips ; 
Martha testified her affection to her Saviour, by 
her eagerness to serve Him ; all was peace, rest, 
and joy, in that habitation where Jesus and His 
disciples used to come and find an agreeable re- 
treat. And now a few days have passed, and 
Lazarus is in the grave, mouldering in corruption : 
Mary bathed in tears, and clothed in a garment 
of mourning, is prostrated at the feet of Jesus ; 
and the Jews, who surround them, made this 
abode of peace resound with their lamentations. 
u Jesus wept'" 



212 MEDITATION IX 

Oh ! how difficult it is to engrave upon our 
hearts the sad truth, that all we possess upon 
earth is only lent to us for a time, and for a very 
short time ; that to-morrow, perhaps, the object of 
our dearest affections may be a corpse ; that all 
that our soul has made a support of, a source of 
joy and of happiness, shall be confounded with the 
dust of the earth ! Disciples of Jesus ! when will 
you cease to make idols of those objects which the 
Lord hath entrusted to you, that you might con- 
secrate them to His service? When will you 
learn that this is neither the place nor the time of 
your rest ? When will you learn to think, to love, 
and to act, as strangers and pilgrims, for whom 
there isbut one thing needful — to reach your native 
country ? And you, ye men of the world, when 
will you cease to hew out unto yourselves in the 
wilderness, " broken cisterns which can hold no 
water?" When will you cease to "sow the 
wind, and reap the whirlwind?" When will you 
cease to seek your happiness, your peace, your life, 
in that which shall disappear to-morrow, like the 
stubble which the wind scattereth ? Ah ! if Jesus 
shed tears of compassion over the guilty Jerusa- 
lem, tears of tenderness over the tomb of a friend, 
what bitter tears would He have shed over your 
deplorable folly ! Let His tears be a powerful les- 
son of instruction to you ! " Jesus wept !" 

But the great soul of Jesus does not confine all 
its melancholy thoughts to that scene of insta- 
bility and grief If the view of a tomb, open and 
ready to receive its prey, makes the heart of every 



JESUS WEPT. 213 

reflecting person beat, what must that sight have 
been to Him who had created man in His own 
image, and assigned him, as his dwelling, not the 
dark tomb, but the delightful bowers of Eden ? 
What a comparison must Jesus have drawn be- 
tween that scene of death which was before Him, 
and that in which He first saw man when he came 
forth from His hand, pure, perfect, and happy, 
enjoying the delights of an existence of felicity 
and love which his Creator had just conferred 
upon him. Could He recognize His own work? 
Must He not have beheld, with bitter feelings, 
the ravages of sin, which had defiled and ruined 
the creature, and hewn out his tomb ? If every 
equipage of death that passes through our streets 
tells the Christian that man is guilty, what must 
the tomb of Lazarus have told Jesus, the Holy 
One and the Just, and what the thought of those 
millions of His creatures, that expire from gene- 
ration to generation, amid agonies and pains, 
(notwithstanding the tears of those who love them,) 
and are engulphed in the abyss which sin has 
dug out, crying to those that have ears to hear. 
' c Man is fallen!" If even the common observet 
cannot contemplate, without emotion, the ruins ol 
a majestic edifice which the tempest has over- 
thrown, what must the architect feel whose sub- 
lime genius has conceived the design of the build- 
ing, and who has watched it with solicitude as it 
rose to its completion ? If we mortal beings, be- 
ings of a day, who are born amid sufferings, and 
grow up among " briers and thorns," which cover 



214 MEDITATION IX. 

an accursed earth by reason of sin, if we groan at 
the sight of a scene of death and destruction, 
which attests our fall and degradation, what must 
have been felt at such a sight by Him who came 
down from the Father, from the abode of peace, 
of holiness, of happiness ! " Jesus wept !" 

But O, my beloved brethren ! my companions 
in exile and misery ! let the tears of Jesus, instead 
of saddening us, be to us a source of the most 
precious consolation. Ah ! if He could shed a 
tear over our miseries, it was because He came to 
earth to deliver us from these miseries ; if our 
woes touch His compassionate heart, He has come 
to supply a remedy for them ; if He weeps over a 
tomb, and over the instability of every thing 
human, He is going to destroy him that hath the 
power of death; if He mourns over the ravages 
of sin, He is going to die, and by His death to 
take away sin and all our defilements. O gene- 
rous grief ! compassionate tears of my Saviour ! 
flow, flow upon our miseries. You sweeten their 
bitterness ; you are a healing balm for our wounds. 
Now we know, we have seen, that " we have not 
a High Priest that cannot be touched with a feel- 
ing of our infirmities." Let us. then, take courage, 
feeble beings, sinful beings ; let us go to this mer- 
ciful Saviour ; let us not fear lest He should cast 
us out ; His tears sufficiently proclaim His love. 
And if the Jews said, i: See how He loved him !" 
let us also say, " See how he loves us !" He is 
always the same. Though He is no longer upon 
earth to shed tears, He is with God, His Father, 



JESUS WEPT. 215 

pleading our cause, interceding for us, demanding 
pardon for our unfaithfulness and for our corrup- 
tions. He knows all our sorrows, all our tempta- 
tions, all our weaknesses ; Bethany has not 
escaped from His memory, nor the unhappy from 
His heart. " Let us come with boldness to the 
throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy, and 
find grace to help in time of need." Let us love 
this Saviour who has so loved us ; let us conse- 
crate to Him our hearts which belong to Him by 
so many titles. O Jesus ! O my Saviour ! Thou 
seest that I wish to love Thee ! Yes, I would 
that I could say with one of Thy servants, " 1 
have but one passion ; it is for Thee, Thee alone." 



MEDITATION X. 

LAZARUS, COME FORTH. 



John xi. 37 — 44. 

Ind some of them said, Could not this man, whica opened the 
eyes of the blind, have caused that even this man should not have 
died 1 Jesus therefore again groaning in Himself cometh to the 
grave. It was a cave, and a stone lay upon it. Jesus said, Take 
ye away the stone. Martha, the sister of him that was dead, saith 
unto Him. Lord, by this time he stinketh: for he hath been dead 
four days. Jesus saith unto her, Said I not unto thee, that, if thou 
wouldest believe, thou shouldest see the glory of God 1 Then they 
took away the stone from the place where the dead was laid. 
And Jesus lifted up His eyes, and said, Father, I thank Thee that 
Thou hast heard Me. And I knew that Thou hearest Me always : 
but because of the people which stand by I said it, that they may 
believe that Thou hast sent Me. And when He thus had spoken, 
He cried with a loud voice, Lazarus, come forth. And he that was 
dead came forth, bound hand and foot with grave-clothes : and his 
face was bound about with a napkin. Jesus saith unto them, 
Loose him, and let him go." 

The part which man performs in the drama of 
.ife, ends with his existence here below. All that 
is purely terrestrial in the history of the greatest 
and most powerful among men, dies with them, 
save perhaps their name, which passes from age 
to age, like the slight trace which the majestic 
vessel leaves after it upon the surface of the wa- 
ters, and which is communicated, for a while, 



LAZARUS, COME FORTH. 217 

from wave to wave, until it is lost in the immen- 
sity of the ocean. Beyond that fatal term, man 
is impotent. He gives back to the earth what he 
had received from it, and all the interests of this 
world, as far, at least, as he is concerned, are at 
an end. Those who write his history, relate his 
actions up to the period of his death ; they pass a 
judgment upon his character, upon the good or 
bad influence which he exerted over his age, and 
their task is ended. Such is equally the lot of the 
hero celebrated for his achievements, and of the 
unhappy being who is distinguished among his 
fellow-men only for his misfortunes. 

How is it, then, that the history which for some 
time has been affording matter for our medita- 
tions, just assumes the deepest, the most lively, 
and the sublimest interest, at the tomb of him who 
forms the subject of it? How is it that instead 
of laying down his pen at the grave of Lazarus, 
and resting satisfied with merely dropping a tear 
to his memory, our historian here especially awa- 
kens our attention, and seems to claim our admi- 
ration for what he has yet to commit to future 
generations ? Ah ! it is because that here he has 
to do with more than mere mortals. It is that we 
have here the Prince. of Life, who by the exercise 
of His omnipotence compels the gloomy empire 
of death, and the limits of human power to re- 
cede before Him. Jesus, the Lord of glory, is 
going to act : what obstacle can the grave put in 
the way of His operation ? Let us summon up 
our attention in His presence ; let us humble our- 

19 



218 MEDITATION X. 

selves with adoration before His power ; let us 
hear our Evangelist. 

Jesus had demanded where they had laid the 
mortal remains of Lazarus. He advances towards 
the abode of death, shedding tears of compassion 
and grief Alas! the dispositions of those around 
Him were little calculated to offer Him consola- 
tion. He sees Mary in tears ; He sees the Jews, 
who already had often been witnesses of His 
mighty works, deriving from these very works an 
argument in support of their unbelief, and asking, 
perhaps, with interest, but also with distrust, 
" Could not this man. which opened the eyes of 
the blind, have caused that even this man should 
not have died ?" What reasoning ! One would 
have expected to hear them draw a directly op- 
posite conclusion, and say, " This man which 
opened the eyes of one born blind, and thus dis- 
played a power altogetner divine, not only could 
(if He had seen fit) have caused that even this 
man should not have died, but also, without any 
doubt, hath power to recall him from the grave." 
But no ; the carnal man does not reason thus ; he 
does not ascend from one of God's perfections to 
the others ; from His power to His love ; from His 
love to His infinite goodness. You must deduce 
from him, one by one, all the consequences of 
those manifestations of grace which his God con- 
descends to vouchsafe to him ; and if at any time 
he understands not the dispensations of eternal 
wisdom towards him, he draws from thence an 
ungrateful conclusion against the very benefits 



219 

which he had received the day before. " There 
is nothing new under the sun." We find this 
same injurious reasoning of unbelief in our own 
hearts, if not upon our lips, when after receiving 
innumerable favours and benefits from the Lord) 
we fall back into distrust, and forget His gifts and 
promises if He leaves us in our trial for a day. It 
was thus that the disciples reasoned on their way 
to Emmaus: " Jesus of Nazareth was a Prophet 
mighty in deed and word before God and all the 
people. But we trusted that it had been He 
which should have redeemed Israel ; and besides 
all this, to-day is the third day since these things 
were done." " O fools," saith the Saviour to them ; 
" O fools, and slow of heart to believe all that 
the prophets have spoken!" (Luke xxiv. 19, 21, 
25.) 

Meanwhile, Jesus waits not to reason with un- 
belief; u He groaned again in Himself" on see- 
ing and hearing those around Him ; but a He 
goes to the sepulchre ;" He goes to confound un- 
belief and distrust; He goes to comfort those 
whom He loves by granting to them more than 
they can ask or think. Alas ! are the most tran- 
scendent favours of our God the only argument 
which can convince us of His love % And yet He 
consents to grant us those favours. O, disciples 
of Jesus! ye who, like Mary and Martha, weep 
for bereavements which ye have sustained, your 
powerful Saviour can and will go with you to the 
tomb of those beloved beings whom you follow 
there with tears. From that tomb itself He will 



220 MEDITATION X. 

find means to draw consolation for yon. if not by 
restoring to you again on earth those whom you 
regret, at least by enabling you to realize, by 3 
living faith, that glorious day when they shall be 
given back to you for ever, pure, holy, and happy. 
That cold clay, which covers from your view those 
mortal remains, and preserves the hallowed germ 
of their glorious resurrection, can no more separate 
them from God and from you, than the stone 
which stopped the mouth of the cave where Laza- 
rus lay, could place a barrier between him and 
the power of Jesus. The Saviour's love is like 
His power ; it knows no obstacle ; " He cometh to 
the grave." 

" It was a cave, and a stone lay upon it," or as 
it may be rendered, " there lay a stone at the en- 
trance of the cave," which, according to custom, 
was hewn out of a rock, and into which they de- 
scended by a few narrow steps, " What," (must 
the unbelieving Jews have said within themselves, 
and perhaps the two sisters of Lazarus also,) 
" what is He going to do at the grave ? Is it to 
weep there ? Does He wash to have the melan- 
choly pleasure of seeing at least the place where 
His friend reposes % Does He wish to bid those 
cold remains a last farewell, and thus to testify to 
the afflicted sisters the sympathy and affection 
which He had for their brother ?" The curiosity 
which gives rise to those questions is rendered still 
more lively by that grave and solemn command of 
Jesus, " Take away the stone !" What anxiety? 
What feelings must the two sisters have expe« 



LAZARUS, COME FORTH. 221 

rienced ! Are they going to behold the cold re- 
mains of their brother whom they so much loved? 
What does Jesus mean? Martha, who, while 
they are taking away the stone, is struck with that 
dreadful savour of death and corruption which ex- 
hales from a body that has fallen into dissolution, 
groans within herself Alas ! it is her brother ! 
She is unable to support the violence of her feel- 
ings; her secret hope flies from her breast; she 
seems to wish to entreat the Lord to allow the 
lifeless body to rest in peace, u Lord," cries she 
with a trembling voice, " by this time he stinketh, 
for he hath been dead four days." Four days ! 
It is then but four days since she could still press 
to her heart that brother whom she loved ; four 
days since Lazarus still responded to her affection; 
but four days since she received his last look, and 
his last adieu ; and already .... a mass of corrup- 
tion. Oh ! the vanity of all that is human ! Aw- 
ful curse of sin ! dust thou art, and unto dust shalt 
thou return ! Men of the world ! worldly women ! 
is it then to this perishable body, this handful of 
clay, that you will consecrate your time, your 
cares, your talents, your fortune, your life ? Ah, 
fools ! you have an immortal soul ; how long will 
you neglect it? how long will you sacrifice it to 
that which in four days shall turn to corruption 
and become the food of worms ? 

These words of Martha afford us another lesson. 
Physicians have decided, that the only infallible 
mark of death is corruption. Well, then! for 
you, unbelievers; for you who foolishly require a 

19* 



222 MEDITATION X. 

mathematical certainty in religious truths, this last 
feature was necessary to our narrative. It was 
necessary, in order that there might not remain 
any pretext for not believing in the reality of the 
miracle which was going to be wrought, and in 
Him who was about to perform it. It was neces- 
sary, in order that if you reject the divinity of His 
mission, the responsibility of your unbelief may 
rest entirely upon your own guilty heads ; it was 
necessary, in order that God might have done 
every thing to convince you and save you ; and 
that He might be found just when He condemns. 
One of your masters, Spinoza, has told the world, 
that if he could have believed the resurrection of 
Lazarus, he would have dashed in pieces his 
whole system, and embraced without repugnance 
the christian faith.* But believe him not; his 
reason could not doubt, it was his heart that would 
not believe. u Ye will not come to Me that ye 
might have life I" 

Jesus, who would not reason with Mary, be- 
cause she was too exclusively under the influence 
of grief; Jesus, who thought it enough to weep 
with her, because He knows the consolation which 
is suited to each individual, condescends in His 
infinite compasssion to stop a moment to strength- 
en the wavering faith of Martha. " Said I not 
unto thee,' 7 saith He, u that if thou wouldest be- 
lieve, thou shouldest see the glory of God?" Oh 
how often might this merciful Saviour have ad 
dressed to us, with justice, this reproach, " Said I 






LAZARUS, COME FORTH. 223 

not unto thee ?" When, in the hour of trial, our 
soul no longer ventures to look to Jesus to obtain 
from Him deliverance or a submissive will ; when 
our heart, shut up by grief, withered by doubt, 
allows its faith to fail, its hopes to disappear ; 
when, in the darkness which surrounds us, we are 
unable to raise our eyes and to behold above us a 
starry sky; when, yielding to doubt, we are ready 
to exclaim with Martha, " Lord, by this time he 
stinketh, for he hath been dead four days," all is 
lost, there is no more hope in this life ; where are 
now the promises of our God? why do these pro- 
mises no longer speak to our souls? might not 
Jesus approach us with this reproof of His tender 
compassion : C{ ' Said I not unto thee, that, if thou 
wouldest believe, thou shouldest see the glory of 
God V In the despondency of thy heart, being 
unable to comprehend this severe dispensation of 
My wisdom, feeling only thy grief, thou art ready 
to be cast down and discouraged; but said I not 
unto thee that all things shall work together for 
good to them that love God? In the feeling of 
thy weakness and of thy misery thou canst only 
mourn because thou makest no progress in the 
knowledge of My ways ; thou doubtest whether I 
am th} Saviour ; finding in thyself so little love, 
thou doubtest whether thou belongest to Me, 
whether I have redeemed thee, whether thou art 
a child of God. But said I not unto thee, that 
4 he that believeth on the Son, hath everlasting 
life V Said I not unto thee, that thou art ' srved 
freely by grace V that l the gift of God is eternal 



224 MEDITATION X. 



life V Said I not unto thee, that ' I break not the 
bruised reed, nor quench the smoking flax? 1 that 
1 like as a father pitieth his children, even so the 
Lord pitieth them that fear Him V " 

" Believe," and thou shalt see the glory of God ! 
Such should be the sole end of thy life ; such the 
object which thou should est seek, even in the 
midst of thy sufferings, instead of sighing only 
after the happiness and interest of the moment 
Oh ! when the old man, with all its strength, 
which is but weakness ; with all its wisdom, which 
is but folly ; when the old man, with all its doubts 
and agonies, with all its fears and anxieties, holds 
its peace and retires into the silence of its own 
nothingness; when in the calm of the soul faith 
pierces the clouds and contemplates the heavens; 
when hope spreads out its wings, shakes off the 
dust of earth, takes its flight above all that is mor- 
tal ; when the heart expands to feel and to love, 
and soars toward its Redeemer, towards Him 
whom it loves though it sees Him not ; when our 
lips are open to give utterance to the cry of Mary. 
" Rabboni" Master, or to the exclamation of Thom- 
as, " My Lord and my God !" when a deep feeling 
of veneration lays us prostrate before God, and 
fills us with an idea of His eternal majesty — then 
the Spirit of the Most High — that Spirit which 
conducted Ezekiel into the valley of vision, to 
show him the glory of God " in the dry bones," 
works in our soul ; we " believe," and we " see 
the glory of God," — the glory of God "in the 



LAZARUS, COME FORTH. 225 

midst of trials," — the glory of God even in the 
presence of the tomb ! 

Meanwhile the stone is taken away, the body 
of Lazarus, laid in its cold abode, bound around 
with grave-clothes, appears to the eyes of all. 
What a sight ! what a feeling of fear, of astonish- 
ment, of horror, of anxious expectation, of secret 
hope, must have taken possession of all the spec- 
tators, according to the dispositions of faith or 
unbelief with which they were influenced. A 
mournful silence reigns around the grave : all 
who are present appear like so many shades in 
this abode of death, whose chilling influence seems 
to have frozen the life in their hearts. Scarcely 
do they venture to raise their eyes from the corpse 
to try and read with anxiety in the looks of Jesus 
what is His intention. The Prince of Life alone 
is filled with that spirit whereby " He calls the 
things which are not as though they were ;" He 
advances majestically to the mouth of the sepul- 
chre — He stops — lifts His eyes to heaven. Ah! 
He wishes not that the eyes and thoughts of those 
around Him should rest upon and grovel among 
the direful ruins of death and destruction. (C Jesus 
lifted up His eyes to heaven," signifying with suf- 
ficient plainness, that on earth there is neither 
succor nor consolation to be ibund ; that we must 
" lift up our eyes unto the hills from whence com- 
eth our help ;" that we must not " seek the living 
among the dead ;" that our soul must take its 
flight, rise upon the wings of faith, above death, 
the grave, affliction, tears ; above the world and 



26 MEDITATION X. 



ourselves. O why, in our trials, do we grievously 
fall back upon ourselves with all the weight of our 
sufferings : why does our soul envelop itself in its 
grief as in a sombre cloud ? Why, when we see 
some beloved being descend into the grave, do we 
follow his cold remains with all our thoughts and 
all oar bleeding affections into the dust of the 
earth, from whence we can draw nothing but grief 
and regret ? Alas ! it is that we are carnal ; we 
cannot, like Jesus, lift up our eyes to heaven, from 
whence we would derive faith, hope, and consola- 
tion ; it is that our dull and unbelieving heart falls 
back to the earth with all its weight, and cannot 
rise above death, and quench with Him, who is 
the living and the eternal One, that thirst for im- 
mortality which devours it, O my Saviour, teach 
us thus to raise our eyes and our thoughts, our af- 
fections and our prayers, to heaven ! 

Jesus would also, in directing the thoughts of 
all to heaven, point to that eternal power by 
which he was going to work a stupendous mira- 
cle. Fie does not wish that any of those around 
Him should remain in doubt in this respect; He 
wishes to give a sacredness to the action which 
He is going to perform ; He wishes that it should 
be ascribed to none but God alone. He had pre- 
dicted that the sickness of Lazarus should sub- 
serve "the glory of God." He proceeds to give, 
by a most striking act, a commentary on His own 
words ; but that no one may divert from God the 
glory which is due to Him, He shows beforehand 



LAZARUS, COME FORTH. 227 

that it is His powerful arm which is going to 
work. 

" Father, I thank Thee that Thou hast heard 
Ma !" What! "That Thou," He saith, "hast 
heard Me I" and yet He has not yet seen His 
prayer answered. Lazarus is still in the tomb, 
the prey of death and corruption. " Thou hast 
heard Me !" and yet not a spark of life has enter- 
ed the bosom of Lazarus. "Thou hast heard 
Me ?" and yet those who surround Him have be- 
fore their eyes only a mouldering corpse. 

O, my beloved brethren ! here is faith ; here 
is prayer; here is confidence in the promises 
of God, who cannot lie. To real faith a promise 
of God is a gift : a prayer sent up to the throne 
of the Most High, in the spirit of supplication, is 
a prayer heard. 

Jesus, on approaching the tomb of Lazarus, 
had prayed in the secret recesses of His heart, 
and in His view that prayer is already heard — 
Lazarus is restored to life, his sisters are com- 
forted, the faith of His disciples is strengthened, 
God is glorified, the Son of Man is glorified. 
Oh ! how different would our prayers be if we 
could thus receive the promises of our God as 
already accomplished! It is by this spit it, this 
faith, that the Apostle Paul sees for himself, and 
for those believers to whom he is writing, all 
difficulties surmounted, all temptations overcome, 
all their combats victoriously terminated, all their 
souls purified from sin, and that he cries out 
triumphantly, " We are more than conquerors 



128 MEDITATION X. 

ihrough Him who loved us." Passing over time 
and life, death and the grave, he cries again, 
" He hath raised us up together, and made us sit 
together in heavenly places in Christ Jesus." 
Embracing by this same faith all the gifts of God, 
still in the promise, he thus speaks to the Corin- 
thians : " Whether the world, or life, or death, or 
things present, or things to come, all things are 
yours and ye are Christ's, and Christ is God's." 
(1 Cor. iii.) " I thank Thee," saith Jesus in an- 
ticipation ; but with what difficulty do we (even 
when we have seen our prayers answered) lift our 
cold hearts to heaven and say, " I thank Thee." 
O ye of little faith, little gratitude, little love ! 

u I know that Thou hearest Me always, but be- 
cause of the people which stand by I said it that 
they may believe that Thou hast sent Me." Who 
does not recognize in this familiar language of 
confidence Him who is one with the Father ; Him 
who from all eternity has taken part in His coun- 
sels ; Him who " was in the beginning with God, 
and was God?" "I know that Thou hearest 
Me always!" and how could it be otherwise with 
Him whom the Father hath proclaimed to earth 
in these words, " This is My beloved Son, in 
whom I am well pleased !" Who does not re- 
cognize in this tender solicitude for the flock which 
surrounds Him, the good Shepherd who giveth 
His life for the sheep; who anxiously traverses 
the mountains and the valleys, to seek that which 
was lost ? O. my brethren, if hitherto we have 
placed so little confidence in our prayers, let us 



LAZARUS, COME FORTH. 229 



take courage ! Jesus is always the same. Even 
now, as in the days of His flesh j before the throne 
of God, as before the grave of Lazarus, He says 
tc His Father, with the same confidence, when 
He prays for us, " I know that Thou hearest Me, 
always!" As our High Priest He offers to God 
His Father our feeble prayers, purified from all 
defilement, and kindled by the fire of His love. 
And, O delightful thought, consoling assurance, 
" God heareth Him always." 

The prayer of Jesus had awakened a holy con- 
fidence in the minds of those who surrounded 
Him, instead of that terror with which the view 
of the corpse had penetrated them. All is thus 
made ready, both in the -minds of those who are 
about to witness this astonishing miracle, and in 
the tomb which was opened to their view. No- 
thing more is wanting than a word of Almighty 
power ; the Incarnate God is going to utter it. 
" And when He had thus spoken, He cried with a 
loud voice, Lazarus come forth !" O amazement ! 
O terror! this single word, which penetrated the 
souls of all who were present, made life enter into 
the bosom of the dead ; the bonds of the tomb are 
broken ; death delivering up its prey, confesses 
itself vanquished by the voice of Jesus ; the eyes 
of all see the cold limbs of Lazarus begin to 
move ; he rises ; he comes forth still bound with 
grave-clothes. What a sight! What a specta- 
cle ! " Then he that was dead came forth, bound 
hand and foot with grave-clothes, and his face 
was bound about with a napkin !" Astonishment, 

20 



230 MEDITATION X. 

terror, seize the minds of all; all remain mute 
with surprise and fear. Martha and Mary dare 
not embrace their brother again ; they cannot be- 
lieve their senses ; doubt and fear impose silence 
upon their affection ; it would appear as if death 
had seized upon the hearts of all to avenge itself 
for the defeat which it had just suffered. Jesus 
alone breaks the silence. He says with majestic 
calmness, 4; Loose him, and let him go." 

O power! O divinity of my Saviour! I bow be- 
fore Thee, and adore Thee in the silence of ad- 
miration. Oh ! how clearly do I recognize here 
that mighty voice which in the beginning said, 
Let there be light, and there was light!" Yes, I 
recognize it, it is the voice which calleth things 
that are not as though they were, and which rais- 
eth the dead. Let my knees bend before the di- 
vine Saviour. " God over all blessed for ever- 
more !" who is like unto Thee in heaven or in 
earth ? Thou spakest, and it was done ; Thou 
commandedst and it stood fast ! At Thy voice 
the grave delivers up its dead ; the corruption of 
the tomb fleeth before Thy face ! Who is there 
in heaven or in earth that can resist Thy power? 
O how happy are we to know that in Thy hand is 
our destiny for eternity ! If Thou lovest us ; if 
we are Thy redeemed ; if Thou art for us, who 
can be against us? What shall we have to fear? 
Death? In Thy presence it has no more power. 
The grave ? At Thy voice it becomes the thea- 
tre of a glorious resurrection, and life flourishes in 
the very field of death. Our soul waiteth upon Thee, 



LAZARUS, COME FORTH. 231 

whether in life or in death. Even from the dust we 
shall lisp forth Thy praises ; we shall mingle our 
feehle voice with the voices of celestial intelli- 
gences, to celebrate Thy glorious name. O our 
divine Saviour, our Redeemer, and our King ! we 
shall ascribe to Thee throughout eternity, glory, 
and strength, and praise. Thou art God over all; 
Thy dominion hath no limits. All the angels of 
God worship Thee. Oh ! may the redeemed of 
every tongue, and people and nation, thus cele- 
brate Thy praises, for ever and ever ! 

What more shall I say to you, my beloved 
brethren ? Shall I describe to you the transports 
of joy and gratitude of the sisters of Lazarus? 
Shall I show them to you, now pressing to their 
hearts with tears of happiness a beloved brother, 
who is about again to partake of their combats, 
their hopes, their fears upon earth, now prostrat- 
ing themselves at the feet of Jesus, filled with a 
lively and never-ceasing gratitude ? Shall I des- 
cribe to you the family of Bethany recovering 
their domestic joys, and consecrating themselves, 
more entirely than ever, to the Author of their 
happiness? Shall I tell you all the lessons which 
the sisters of Lazarus drew from the issue of their 
trial — lessons of faith, of gratitude, of love to 
Jesus, a thousand times more precious still than the 
happiness of possessing a beloved brother? Shall 
I show you this happy family again possessing 
Jesus among them six days before the passover, 
that is, six days before His death (John xii. 1 — 8,) 
and Mary, eagerly seizing the first opportunity 



232 MEDITATION X. 

which presented itself, publicly to testify to her 
Saviour her gratitude and love, by publicly ren- 
dering to Him the honour due to her Lord and 
her King, whose Majesty she had witnessed at 
the tomb of her brother? Shall I show you 
Martha joyfully waiting upon Him as in the days 
of their former prosperity, and Lazarus sitting at 
table with his Divine Saviour, who had raised 
him from the dead — a living witness of His 
power and godhead ? What a picture ! what a 
termination to so many trials where Jesus appears 
as a comforter ! In fine, shall I speak to you of 
what must have passed in the minds of the dis- 
ciples, for whose sake Jesus was pleased to give 
this striking manifestation of His omnipotence, 
and to whom He had said " I am glad for your 
sakes that I was not there, to the intent ye may 
believe ?" No, we will not stop to meditate on 
these subjects, however interesting: we will leave 
them to your own reflections, and rather direct 
our thoughts to ourselves, for the resurrection 
of Lazarus concerns us also ; and if he came 
forth from the tomb at the command of Jesus, it 
was to convey to us, even to us also, strong con- 
solation, powerful encouragement, salutary in- 
structions. Yet a little while, and that voice 
of pow T er which was heard at Bethany, shall be 
heard again with the sound of the last trumpet, 
through the wide expanse of heaven ; and we all, 
whatever be our condition, shall rise like Lazarus, 
and with us, all the generations of mankind 
which have appeared in succession upon the 






LAZARUS, COME FORTH. 233 

earth. What a moment ! what a scene ! Oh ! 
how happy, then, shall be the friends of Jesus; 
the Lazaruses, the Marthas, the Marys, who shall 
behold again, with transports of happiness, those 
whom they loved in the Lord upon earth, those 
whose departure cost them so many tears, those 
with whom they shall be united for ever in that 
place where there shall be no more misery nor 
pain, nor separation, nor death, nor mourning, nor 
tears, because there shall be no more sin ! The 
happiness of the family of Bethany is but a feeble 
image of that blessedness, since, alas ! that family 
was still upon earth, exposed to trials, conflicts, 
and anxieties ; and its members, after having en- 
joyed their happiness for a short time, were 
doomed again to bid each other a final adieu, as 
far as this world is concerned ! If we belong to 
Jesus, who is the resurrection and the life, let His 
power, which is equalled only by His love, be our 
consolation, our support, our secret refuge ! Let 
nothing affright us, nothing cast us down ! Let 
us, by that hope which maketh not ashamed, pass 
over time and the grave ! Let us realize, by an 
unshaken faith, the glorious promises of our 
Divine Saviour, and the happiness of seeing, as 
He is, Him who hath so loved us, who hath wept 
over our trials and our afflictions, Him who willeth 
that " where He is, there we may be with Him 
also." Let us appropriate to ourselves the tender 
compassion which He manifested towards the 
family of Bethany ! 

Let the tears which He shed over the tomb of 
20* 



234 MEDITATION X. 

a friend, flow into the wounds which death in- 
flicts upon our hearts. And while we hear His 
irresistible voice calling forth Lazarus from the 
tomb, let us remember that He has " overcome 
for us the world, the devil, death, and the grave ; 
and that now in all things we are more than con- 
querors through Him that loved us!" It was my 
intention to have terminated my meditation here ; 
but, shall I say it ? — amid those sweet thoughts 
upon which w T e have been dwelling, an involun- 
tary feeling of fear has crept into my heart. Yes, 
I must tell it to you ; were we to indulge it, it 
would make us shudder with horror. I picture to 
my mind that solemn moment when, " at the 
voice of Him who raiseth the dead," we shall all 
come forth from the grave ; when all we who are 
here present in this house of worship, shall see 
and recognize one another, like Lazarus and his 
two sisters, when with transports of joy, they 
rushed into one another's embraces, in the pre- 
sence of the Redeemer. And if, at that moment, 
when we are about to see our eternal destiny de- 
cided, it shall be found that any of you whom I 
now behold seated on those benches, listening to 
my meditations, if it shall be found that even one 
of you belongs »not to Jesus, that he has not re- 
ceived from Him pardon unto life, that he is yet 
in his sins, and under the weight of that condem- 
nation which he has deserved ; deceived by vain 
delusions, by an appearance of religion ; in a word, 
without God, without a Saviour, without hope, 
having neither part nor lot in this matter I Oh, 



LAZARUS, COME FORTH. 235 

terror ! oh, despair ! I cannot for a moment en- 
dure this agonizing thought; it overwhelms my 
heart ; it rushes upon my soul, like the rocks and 
mountains, which the reprobate shall call upon 
and supplicate in vain to fall upon them, and cover 
them from the wrath of Him that sitteth upon the 
throne. O immortal, accountable beings ! I be- 
seech you by the mercies of God, avert, avert this 
dreadful anticipation, by hastening this day, this 
hour, to Golgotha, and seeking there a refuge at 
the foot of the cross of Christ. And you who have 
among your friends, or perhaps in your families, 
some Lazarus, some being dear to your hearts by 
the bonds of nature or of friendship, who is still 
ignorant of the Saviour, and has not called upon 
the only Name by which we must be saved ; oh ! 
pray, supplicate the Divine Redeemer to touch 
the heart of that beloved being, to snatch him from 
inevitable ruin, as a brand plucked out of the 
burning ; to save him in spite of himself, while 
pardon, salvation, and reconciliation are possible. 
My God ! my God ! is there among those who 
hear Thy word, who see Thy love and Thy com- 
passion; is there among those w r hom I know, 
whom I love upon earth, any one who in the 
great day shall become a monument of Thine 
eternal justice, instead of being a monument of 
Thy grace and of Thine eternal love ! Divine 
Saviour ! if Thou hast ever heard a prayer, if 
Thou hast ever allowed Thyself to be moved by 
an earnest supplication, or by the cry of a soul in 
distress, take away, take away from my heart the 



236 MEDITATION X. 

overwhelming weight of this agonizing fear ! Oh, 
I must hope, I must hope, or — ah ! pardon, Lord ! 
Thou wiliest not the death of a sinner; Thou 
wiliest rather that he should be converted and 
live ; and with Thee aL things are possible. 



MEDITATION XL 

CONCLUSION. 
John xi. 45 — 52. 

Then many of the Jews which came to Mary, and had seen th€ 
things which Jesus did, believed on Him. Bat some of them wen 
their ways to the Pharisees, and told them what things Jesus had 
done. Then gathered the Chief Priests and the Pharisees a council, 
and said, what do we? for this Man doeth many miracles. If we 
let Him thus alone, all men will believe on Him : and the Romans 
shall come and take away both our place and nation. And one of 
them, named Caiaphas, being the High Priest that same year, said 
unto them, Ye know nothing at all, nor consider that it is expedi- 
ent for us, that one man should die for the people, and that the 
whole nation perish not. And this spake he not of himself: but 
being High Priest that year, he prophesied that Jesus should die 
for that nation ; and not for that nation only, but that also He 
should gather together in one the children of God that were scat- 
tered abroad" 

If there be a prophecy, to the truth of which 
all ages, from the time of Jesus Christ to the pre- 
sent day, have borne a striking and irresistible 
witness, it is that which Simeon pronounced in the 
temple of Jerusalem, when, embracing in his arms, 
now enfeebled by age, the infant in whom he saw 
the hope and salvation of Israel — the desire of all 
nations, he said, " Behold this child is set for the 
fall and rising again of many in Israel, and for a 



238 MEDITATION XI. 

sign which shall be spoken against." This pro- 
phecy was indeed fulfilled during the whole course 
of the -Saviour's ministry ; it was fulfilled at the 
tomb of Lazarus, when some believed, and others 
went their way to stir up the hatred of the Phari- 
sees ; it was fulfilled at the period of His death, 
when some cried, a Crucify Him, crucify Him ! 
His blood be on us and on our children," while 
uture ages were to see in the cross, and in the 
blood of the New-Testament, the sign of their 
eternal salvation ; it was fulfilled in the first 
preaching of the Apostles, who were beaten with 
rods by some, while thousands of others were con- 
verted that they might have life ; it has been ful- 
filling during eighteen hundred years, in all places 
where the Gospel of Christ has b&en preached ; 
that Gospel which has been to some " a savour 
of death unto death," but unto others a " savour 
of life unto life," and "the power of God unto 
salvation to them that believe." It is still fulfill- 
ing in our own day, when the doctrine of Christ 
crucified continues to excite hatred and persecu- 
tion, while it constitutes the consolation, the joy, 
and the life of all those who believe. 

Let the enemies of the Gospel then know that 
with all their enmity and rancour they are work- 
ing a deceitful work. Let them know that they 
are living witnesses of the truth of those very doc- 
trines which they oppose ; that they powerfully 
confirm our faith in Christ crucified ; that they 
are accomplishing a most important prophecy; 
that they are building up that which they would 



CONCLUSION. 239 

pull down, even to its foundations ; that they have 
the misery of being blind and unwilling instru- 
ments in the hands of the Almighty for the estab- 
lishment of a kingdom of which they shall not be 
citizens ; that they are like those hireling work- 
men of the Israelites, who prepared with great la- 
bour the materials of a magnificent temple into 
which they were never to be allowed to enter. 

The end of the miracle of Christ was attained 
as it regarded the family of Bethany, who were 
comforted, and came out of their trial full of joy, 
confidence, and love ; it was attained with regard 
to the disciples, who saw in it the glory of God ; 
it was attained with regard to many of the Jews, 
who, " having seen the things which Jesus did, 
believed on Him." Was it attained with regard 
to the other witnesses? Was it attained with re- 
gard to the body of the Pharisees, High Priests, 
and Scribes ? Alas ! it was ; but in the sense of 
the fatal prophecy of Simeon. Let us hear our 
historian for the last time, and " he that hath ears 
to hear, let him hear." 

" Many of the Jews which came to Mary," 
(being persons of a sincere and upright heart, a 
heart prepared by the grace of God,) " and had 
seen the things which Jesus did, believed on Him." 
It was natural for men of an honest and upright 
disposition to infer from the greatness of the mira- 
cle, the greatness of Him who had wrought it by 
a single word of His omnipotence. They saw 
that manifestation of the divine power with their 
own eyes ; they had the happiness to believe that 



240 MEDITATION XI. 

it could be none other than the Christ, the Mes- 
siah, promised to Israel, to whom such a power 
had been given ; they saw with their eyes, and 
they believed with their heart. And although we 
cannot suppose that their faith was as yet enlight- 
ened by the whole truth which Jesus had come to 
communicate to the world, yet from the time that 
they believed in His divinity, their heart was open, 
and ready to receive with submission and full 
confidence every word that proceeded out of His 
mouth. What more was wanting? the end of 
Jesus was attained. " Because of the people 
which stand by I said it, that they may believe 
that Thou hast sent Me." 

Miracles alone do not convert ; but they dispose 
the heart, through faith, to give heed to the word 
of eternal life, which is the instrument of conver- 
sion. Nicodemus believes the miracles of Jesus ; 
he sees in them a proof of His Divinity: " Rab- 
bi," saith he, " We know that Thou art a teacher 
come from God, for no man can do these miracles 
which Thou doest, except God be with him." 
Yet Nicodemus, notwithstanding that degree of 
faith, and although a Master in Israel, is ignorant 
of the first elements of the doctrine of regenera- 
tion ; but constrained by that faith, he comes to 
Jesus, and earnestly asks to be instructed in the 
knowledge of salvation, which he is thus disposed 
to receive. Such was the faith produced in the 
hearts of the Jews, by the miracle of Jesus. It is 
a first step, but a step which most frequently leads 
farther. Such also was the end for which St. 



CONCLUSION, 241 

John left us this admirable account of the resur- 
rection of Lazarus, with all its minute details. 
To every one who reads it with attention, it has a 
force of evidence as strong as it had to those who, 
like St. John, were eye-witnesses of the fact. "Is 
this, then," (must he exclaim who sincerely seeks 
the truth,) " is this the Saviour whom the Gospel 
proclaims to me ? Oh ! I will open my whole 
soul to such a Master, such a Saviour ; I know 
that in following Him I cannot walk in darkness. 
I will study, line by line, the word of eternal truth, 
which He has brought down from heaven ; I 
know that that word cannot cause either my mind 
or my heart to err ; I will meditate upon it with 
full confidence ; I will hail the Author of it as my 
Guide, my King, my Redeemer!" The soul thus 
disposed will not be long in finding that the doc- 
trine and word of Christ crucified is sweeter to his 
heart than honey to his mouth ; and from faith in 
a miracle, he will rise to the faith of experience ; 
he will see, he will feel more divinity in a line of 
the eternal word, than the Jews saw at the tomb 
of Lazarus. Such is the place, beautiful and use- 
ful, which miracles should occupy in the divine 
economy. Hence we are fully persuaded that 
those who expect the revival of miraculous pow- 
ers in the Church ere it arrive at its promised 
glory, reverse the order of things. They would 
descend to the lowest step, instead of ascending, 
like the angels on the ladder of Jacob, and con- 
templating the heavens above. They would 
themselves return and bring back others to the 

21 



242 MEDITATION XL 

faith of Nicodemus, the faith of miracles — a faith 
which may exist without a knowledge of the love 
of God, and of the new life, and which at the 
most can do no more than lead to it ; instead of 
rising by the faith of the heart, the faith of love, 
the faith of confidence, to the loftiest heights of spi- 
rituality and of the christian life. They desire the 
" milk of children, instead of the strong meat of 
old men ," " God is love, and he that loveth abid- 
eth in God." Now what has h.e who abideth in 
God by love, to do with the visible material man- 
ifestation of the power and love of his God 1 
Whether is St. John, reclining w T ith confidence 
upon the bosom of his Master, or the multitude 
that follow 7 him, loudly demanding miracles, near- 
er to Jesus? Jesus Himself hath answered the 
question. u An evil and adulterous generation 
seeketh after a sign ; and there shall no sign be 
given unto it, but the sign of the prophet Jonas. 
And He left them, and departed." (Matt. xvi. 4.) 
Yet Jesus, in his infinite condescension, has of- 
ten made use of miracles, to draw to Himself the 
giddy minds of " an evil and adulterous genera- 
tion." And we are far from concluding, from 
what we have just said, with some systematizing 
Christians, that because miracles have for a time 
ceased, they shall never again be revived in 
the Church. We shall not, however, stop to ex- 
amine this unprofitable question. We shall ra- 
ther proceed to consider, for our instruction, how 
the Jews of Bethany profited by the greatest mi- 
racle that was ever performed before the eyes of 



CONCLUSION. 243 

men. Ah ! what would the disciples, what would 
the sisters of Lazarus have said, if amid their 
joys, amid their happiness, and amid the over- 
flowings of their lively affection, they had been 
told that the work of might and of love, that pow- 
erful appeal which was to be re-echoed through all 
Judea, and throughout all ages, that the resurrec- 
tion of Lazarus was to become the second cause 
of the sufferings and death of the Holy One and 
the Just ? Could they have believed it ? And 
yet, oh mystery of depravity ! such was the case ; 
this is what the disciple whom Jesus loved now 
proceeds to relate. How did not his pen, after 
having described, in so touching a manner, the 
love and compassion of Jesus, shrink from disclos- 
ing to us those depths of iniquity ? Ah ! it was 
because we needed to know well, that " whoso- 
ever loveth is born of God," and that " the whole 
world lieth ir wickedness." 

u But somo of them went their way to the Phari- 
sees, and told them what things Jesus had done." 
What! they had come to Bethany, to comfort 
Martha and Mary ; they had seen their grief, they 
had seen their Heavenly Friend approach the 
tomb of Lazarus, weeping 5 they had seen Him 
raise His majestic eyes to heaven ; they had 
heard His prayer ; they had heard His irresistible 
voice, " Lazarus come forth!" They had seen 
him that was dead come forth from the tomb ; 
they had seen the transports of joy, and happi- 
ness, and gratitude, which took possession of all 
hearts present ; and instead of " seeing the glory 



244 MEDITATION XI. 

of God/' and falling down at the feet of Jesus, 
they go to tell these things to those who were 
known to be His most inveterate enemies. Such 
is man, or such is what he will become the mo- 
ment he is given up to his own hardness of heart, 
and enmity against God! And yet you say that 
he is naturally good ; that he loves truth, that he 
yields to evidence. Sooner would I believe you, 
were you to tell me that the rock which stands 
upon the sea-shore yields to the billows which for 
ages have dashed against it without effect, and 
driven back, expired at its base. If the overpow- 
ering evidence which issued from the tomb of 
Lazarus was not sufficient to convince man j if 
the love which Jesus there displayed could not 
touch his heart, or conciliate his enmity, then seek 
in your systems of religion and morality some 
more powerful means of producing these effects, 
and prove the goodness and natural tenderness of 
the heart of man. But we forewarn you that we 
require facts; that we will not be satisfied with 
words, or phrases, or mere assertions. Ah ! rather 
acknowledge that the pow T er of grace alone is ca- 
pable of persuading, of touching, and of changing 
man's heart. Say not that if revelation were 
accompanied with more evidence, or if there were 
in the Gospel fewer things above reason, man 
would more easily believe. No ; the Jews who, 
at the tomb of Lazarus, continued unbelievers, and 
enemies to Christ, exhibit an undeniable evidence 
against your reasonings, and supply us with a 
commentary of facts upon these remarkable words 



CONCLUSION. 245 

of Jesus: " If they hear not Moses and the proph- 
ets, neither will they he persuaded, though one 
rose from the dead." (Luke xvi, 31.) Do ye re- 
quire another proof? Let us hear the chief priests 
and Pharisees. " Then the chief priests and 
Pharisees," having heard the account which was 
given them hy eye-witnesses of the resurrection 
of Lazarus, gathered a special council to delibe- 
rate on that important affair. The chief priests ! 
The ministers of religion, the men to whom God 
had committed the charge of labouring for His 
glory and for the advancement of His kingdom; 
those whose duty it was to exert all their power 
and influence for the spread of His truth, as soon 
as they became acquainted with it, and whatever 
it might cost thern ! Now how do they comply 
with these obligations? " What do we ?" say they 
among themselves. Independently of the know- 
ledge which they have of their duty as ministers 
of religion, in this case it is impossible that they can 
be in error, or even in doubt; they are convinced 
of the reality of the miracles of Christ; this they 
acknowledge themselves, " This man doeth many 
miracles ;" and this knowledge, this persuasion, 
is a precious talent confided to their trust, of 
which, whatever be their opinion, they must give 
an awful account hereafter. 

Now with so much knowledge, so much light, 
such convictions, does there rise up among them 
some Gamaliel, to make the voice of truth and 
justice be heard with power ? Is there in the 
ecclesiastical body some Israelite without guile, 

21* 



246 MEDITATION XI. 

who says, ■" This Man doeth many miracles!' 
then he is from God ; then we ought to hear him 
and humbly to range ourselves among his follow 
ers. No ! on the contrary, in their council, all is 
passion, selfishness, and pride. Idolaters of them- 
selves, of their pride, of their vanity, of their influ- 
ence, of their money, they have no fear of God 
before their eyes, and hence what can we expect 
from them? No more than we can expect from 
any man whose heart has not been changed and 
sanctified. Here it cannot be said that we have 
taken an example of the human heart from the 
most depraved class of society. On the contrary, 
these were men of the greatest enlightenment * 
men in whom education might have been expec- 
ted to have developed most fully the moral feel- 
ing j in a word, they were ministers of religion. 
Well, then, let us hear them ; let us seek in them 
those principles of justice, uprightness, and virtue, 
which are said to exist in the human heart. 
Hear their reasoning ; hear how they answer this 
natural question ; " What shall we do ?" 

" If we let Him thus alone, all men will believe 
on Him, and the Romans shall come and take 
away both our place and nation." " If we let 
Him thus alone !" Thus from the outset their in- 
quiry is not whether He is of God, whether he 
declares the truth, whether He is the Messiah 
promised to Israel ! The question of truth and 
justice is from the very commencement trampled 
under foot ! they do not give it a moment's de- 
liberation : they do not even take it into consider- 



CONCLUSION. 247 

ation. One thing alone enters into their counsels 
— not to let Him alone, to oppose Him by force, 
to condemn Him. Oh! depth of iniquity! fright- 
ful degradation of the human heart! inconceiv- 
able contempt of the most obvious and the most 
sacred principles of justice and virtue ! This 
single sentence discovers to us the whole of that 
deep corruption which fills the soul of those 
judges of Israel, those false prophets, who having 
the key of knowledge, not only refuse to enter in 
themselves, but hinder them that were entering 
in. " If we let Him alone 1" Fools 1 feeble worms 
of the earth! ye deliberate in your miserable 
pride, if you will lei Him alone who has just com- 
manded with authority death and the grave ; Him 
who has just displayed to us a power altogether 
divine ■ Him who made the worlds j Him who by 
a single word could command you back into that 
original nothing out of which He had brought 
you 1 Thus it is that a deplorable blindness in- 
variably accompanies passion and enmity against 
God. Thus it is that in our own days, as well as in 
the days of Christ, we see the great ones of the 
earth, the Pharisees, and chief priests, " imagining 
vain tilings, and taking counsel' against the Lord 
and His anointed,'' against the eternal truth of 
Cod, to which the whole universe is promised as 
a conquest. There is, then, "nothing new under 
the sun ;" and since Christ Himself, since His dis- 
ciples after Him, and His servants in every age 
have found inveterate enemies in those very per- 
sons who, from their calling, ought to have se 



248 MEDITATION XI. 

eonded with their utmost efforts the faithful wit- 
nesses of the " truth as it is in Jesus," shall we be 
astonished if in our day we meet with the same 
enmity, the same obstacles, and the same perse- 
cutions in the cause of religion? We may be 
grieved by it, but we must not be astonished ; we 
may suffer from it, but we must not cease to call 
upon Him who is all-powerful to " open the eyes 
of the blind." 

But let us go on, let us hear the arguments of 
the chief priests, for they must have arguments, 
or at least pretexts, from whatever quarter they 
may be drawn ; and they are as follows : — 

" If we let Him thus alone, all men will believe 
on Him, and the Romans shall come and take 
away both our place and nation." Here are two 
powerful reasons ; two most conclusive conside- 
rations. All men will believe on Him, and the 
Romans shall come ; but not a word about what 
Jesus had done worthy of condemnation ; not a 
word about principle ] the whole argument rests 
upon imaginary consequences ; and yet He must 
be condemned. " All men will believe on Him." 
What a testimony to the power of the truth which 
Jesus preached! Ah? if He be God; if He has 
done many miracles ; if He be the Messiah, the 
Deliverer promised to Israel, then rejoice in the 
faith which is reposed in Him ; be She first to hold 
Him up to the people as a teacher whom they ought 
to follow, a Saviour whom they ought to love, and 
in whom they ought to place their confidence. 
You ought to know the prophecies which proclaim 



CONCLUSION. 249 

Him to the world ; you have been appointed as 
watchmen in Israel ; you ought to be acquainted 
with the times and seasons for the restoration of 
the spiritual kingdom of David. Why are you 
not at your post? why do you not proclaim Him 
from Moses 7 seat as the King Messiah, the Saviour? 
But if " all believe on Him," what will become of 
our influence over the people, our honours, our 
reputation, our stations ? This is the point ; this 
is the real argument ; this is what you fear much 
more than the Romans: this. is your idol — pride. 
Before that idol all must bow the knee, even the 
King of Glory Himself, who had just raised Laza- 
rus from the dead, and whom the prophecies of 
four thousand years had predicted to the world ; 
" The Romans shall come V 1 And what of that ? 
Ye children of Abraham, who glory in your liberty: 
who, though vanquished by the conqueror of the 
world, boast that you have never bowed the neck 
beneath the humiliating yoke of Caesar, to whom 
you obstinately refuse the title of Master; behold ! 
you tremble when the question at issue is eternal 
truth, the glory of your nation, the eternal salva- 
tion of the immortal souls which God has com- 
mitted to your care. Where is your courage ? 
But no ; this is but a vain pretext • for the chief 
priests well knew that the Romans, out of policy, 
tolerated all the religions of the nations which 
they conquered, and that the Jewish people would 
no more be destroyed for believing in Jesus than 
for believing in Moses. And yet what a power- 
ful argument, could the speaker but inspire his 



250 MEDITATION XI. 

colleagues with this fear of seeing themselves, the 
temple, and the nation exterminated. No more 
temple, no more honours, no more posts of profit, 
no more revenues; — thus we have arrived at our 
first conclusion — He must be condemned ! 

Yet, oh ! the blindness of the man who exalts 
himself against God. It has been ever true, that 
" the wicked worketh a deceitful work." The 
priests condemn Jesus, lest £{ all men should be- 
lieve in Him, 7 ' and it is precisely the death of the 
Holy One, and the Just, that shall awaken in the 
hearts of the men of all generations faith in Jesus ; 
it is just that death that, at the first preaching of 
Peter who charged the nation with it, touched 
with compunction and converted to the faith of 
Jesus five thousand souls. The priests condemn 
Jesus lest the Romans should " come and take 
away their place and nation ;" and it is just by 
that act, that filling up the measure of their sins, 
they bring down upon themselves the final judg- 
ment of a holy and righteous God ; and, in fact, 
the Romans did come and destroy the priests, and 
the temple, and the nation. Oh \ were there 
among the enemies of God in all ages and in all 
places, any remains of wisdom ; were the veil 
which covers their eyes less thick, they would 
tremble at the thought of being found u fighting 
against God." 

Such were the arguments which were under 
discussion in the assembly, when Caiaphas, who 
in virtue of his dignity as high-priest, presided over 
*hat iniquitous council, impatient of a deliberation 



CONCLUSION. 25 

which he found already too long, rises and ex- 
claims with a tone of anger, " Ye know nothing 
at all, nor consider that it is expedient that one 
man should die for the people, and that the whole 
nation perish not." It is expedient. Such is the 
motive before which all others must disappear ; — 
such is- the shameful consideration which must im- 
pose silence upon justice. Our interest is con- 
cerned — we must then condemn Him. How well 
do these words discover the real thoughts of these 
judges! What a lesson do they teach all future 
generations ! It is probable that the other judges 
would not have dared thus to expose to the light 
of day the turpitude of their thoughts (for in the 
absence of virtue men wish at least to have the 
appearance of it;) but God permits the high 
priest, the successor of Aai*on, to tell the world 
what is the real motive of the actions of the man 
who proclaims war against eternal truth. Expe- 
diency ; vile self-interest, avowed, or concealed 
under the mantle of hypocrisy : this is the god of 
this world; the prince of this world; the impure 
idol to which every thing must be sacrificed. 
And to preserve the temple of this god of the un- 
converted man, it is not enough to oppose the 
truth, as the other members of the Sanhedrim sug- 
gested ; it is necessary to stifle it and not to com- 
bat it; it is necessary not only to prove that Jesus 
is wrong, but to put Him to death: u It is expe- 
dient for us that one man should die for the peo- 
ple." And who can be surprised? Who does 
not know that impiety gives a loose rein to that 



252 MEDITATION XI. 

enmity which is at the bottom of the unregenerate 
man's heart, and that " he that hateth his brother 
is a murderer," whether in fact or in intention 
matters little in the eyes of God. 

But, it will be said, Caiaphas had in view the 
interest of the nation. It would appear, then, that 
the principle which sanctions the sacrifice of an 
innocent individual for the general interest, the 
principle in accordance with which men have 
commanded an assassination in the name of jus 
tice, is not u new under the sun ;" the mind of 
Caiaphas was imbued with it; it was with him 
a political axiom ; this is that reason of state which 
might with more propriety be called a reason of 
hell and the policy of devils. The thousands of 
victims sacrificed to this principle cry from earth 
to heaven, and proclaim the moral degradation of 
the human species more loudly than any thing we 
can say upon the subject. But no; we have al- 
ready shown that the preservation of the nation, 
as far as the Romans were concerned, was by no 
means involved in the people's believing in Jesus. 
Here all is blind passion, all is self-interest. 
Melancholy discovery ! humbling truth ! Yes, O 
[esus ! die, die for the people ; die, die to raise 
them from this deep degradation ; die to produce 
in us a new life. 

Astonishing ! it is this depth of deliverance and 
of salvation that Caiaphas prophecies. Like 
Balaam, he would utter a malediction, and he 
pronounces a blessing ; he commands a murder, 
and he brings about the propitiatory sacrifice 



CONCLUSION. 253 

which shall be the redemption of the world. Let 
us hear the commentary of St. John, " And this 
spake he not of himselfj but being high-priest that 
year, he prophesied that Jesus should die for that 
nation." 

Caiaplias was the high-priest, the president oi 
the supreme ecclesiastical court; his involuntary 
prophecy must come from one high in authority, 
to receive from this circumstance the greater im 
portance, to sound solemnly in the ears of those 
around him, and to be handed down to future 
ages. " This spake he not of himself." Alas ! 
his impious thought, his iniquitous proposition, is 
really from himself, or rather from the devil; — 
but oh the depth of the wisdom and power of 
God ! Caiaphas imagines that he only obeys his 
own passions : he thinks to serve the interest of 
the kingdom of darkness, and God makes of him, 
unknown to himself, a prophet of the truth, a 
preacher of the glad tidings of salvation ! God 
might have sent upon this enemy of Christ one 
of those signal judgments, by which He often 
punishes the wicked before the eyes of all: He 
might have smitten him, like Herod, and made 
him die a miserable death, being " eaten of 
worms." But no ; even the enemy of God must' 
subserve the glory of the Eternal ; the blind in- 
strument of Satan must proclaim the mercy of 
God towards a fallen world ; the very words 
which flow from a heart full of hatred and wrath 
must become a song of praise and thanksgiving 
for future ages. Who henceforward will dare to 

22 



254 MEDITATION XI. 

oppose the designs of our God ? The enemies of 
Christ assembled together, and it is from the midst 
of that council that God draws the accomplish- 
ment of His promises concerning the glorious 
kingdom of His Son, and it is the leader of that 
council that must proclaim to the world the event 
by which all the powers of darkness are to be 
trampled under foot ; if God does not annihilate 
His enemies, He can employ them as instruments 
of His will ; He can draw praises out of hell ; He can 
constrain the powers of darkness to exclaim, like the 
angels of heaven, Glory ! glory to God on high ! 

Condemn then, put to death the Prince of Life ! 
and if His death become the signal of your eter- 
nal ruin, around His cross (to use the language of 
the Evangelist) shall be " gathered together not 
only that nation, but also the children of God 
which were scattered abroad." It was not only 
for the people of Israel, whose interests the priests 
affected to have at heart, that it behoved Jesus to 
die, but for the children of God; for the redeemed 
of all people, nations, languages, and tribes which 
belonged to Him by the election of grace. 

Ye children of God — ye who are still scattered 
abroad amid trials and conflicts, consider then the 
will of Him who died for you ; He wishes to ga- 
ther you together ; He wishes first to lead captive 
to the foot of the cross all your thoughts and all 
your affections ; He wishes to separate you from 
the world, and to gather you mto His fold : and 
what have you to fear? Hear His prayer which 
ascends to heaven on your behalf: u Father, I will 






CONCLUSION. 255 

that they whom Thou hast given Me be with Me 
where I am." And this prayer has been heard. 
Nor is there one of your enemies that shall not 
eventually contribute to your eternal salvation, 
and give glory to Him who has saved you. To 
be gathered together from your dispersion to dwell 
in the eternal assembly of the children of God. 
Such is your glorious portion, such is the will of 
your heavenly Father ; and who shall oppose it ? 
Who shall pluck you out of His hand % "I am 
persuaded that neither death, nor life, nor angels, 
nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, 
nor things to come, nor height, nor depth, nor any 
other creature, shall be able to separate us from 
the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our 
Lord." (Rom. viii. 38, 39.) 

Oh ! if my feeble voice, which in the course of 
these meditations has been able to do no more 
than address a few afflicted souls whom Jesus 
invites to taste of the consolations of the word of 
God ; if my feeble voice could reach those who 
still in any way oppose the designs of God's 
mercy towards them ; how would I entreat them 
with tears to have pity on themselves ; to come, 
while there is yet time, to the only source of life 
— Jesus, the Saviour of sinners. A few days 
more, O immortal souls, and ye shall see with 
your eyes the Lord of Glory, who shall come, no 
longer to shed tears of compassion over the tomb 
of a friend or to mourn over the folly of those 
who reject Him, but to exercise justice and judg- 
ment, and u to punish with everlasting destruction 



25 f) MEDITATION XI. 

them that know not God, and obey not the Gos- 
pel of the Lord Jesus Christ." 

Oh ! love Jesus at the tomb of Lazarus, that 
ye may love Him also when He comes on the 
throne of His glory. 

But Thou only, oh my Saviour, art mighty 
to call us forth, like Lazarus, from the tomb of 
our corruption, to restore life to these dry bones, 
to give us a new heart capable of loving Thee — 
a new life, that we may devote ourselves to Thy 
service. Oh ! let thy powerful word be brought 
home to us. Let not our spiritual death, let not 
our corruptions put any obstacle in the way of 
that word by which Thou " callest things that are 
not as though they were !" Let thine infinite 
love inflame our cold hearts ; eradicate their self- 
ishness, banish their enmity ! To love Thee, 
O gracious Redeemer ; to love thee with all our 
heart, and mind, and soul, is the object of our 
being, the destination for which Thou hast given 
us existence, for which thou hast redeemed us at 
so great a price. Make us attain this end before 
it be too late ! Rescue us from perdition — save 
us, as it were in spite of ourselves ! Rut no, 
Lord ; we wish to love Thee as a willing people , 
we wish to consecrate to Thee our heart, our af- 
fections, our life, our last breath ! Art not Thou 
the Being supremely wise, supremely good ! 
Ah! "to whom shall we go? Thou hast the 
words of eternal life !" . 

G83 82 'i 














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